His eyebrows scooted a little closer to his nose.
“I’m sorry I blabbed about our engagement. I didn’t think it was a secret since you told Cruz—”
“That’s not it, Amara.”
“Then what is . . .it?”
“Getting engaged shocked and confused me, but I was neither miserable nor angry,” he said without glancing away from the fire. “I guess it just hurts to hear how upset it made you.”
“You scowled at me throughout dinner.”
“Because you had your back to me, Amara. You didn’t even attempt to be civil.”
A startled breath escaped me.
He ran one hand down his face. “Forget it. I’m just tired.”
“You can’t say something like that, then tell me to forget it.” I lowered my palms and leaned back. “I’m sorry. I promise not to turn my back on you, or bite your head off for holding my hand during the binding ceremony next time the Cauldron appears.”
His rigid posture finally softened under his borrowed cream Henley. “Next time, huh?”
I circled my finger in the air as though I were trussing him up. “Strings. Everywhere.”
His face broke into a heartbreakingly sweet smile that heated my blood quicker than the little fire in front of me, quicker than all of his crooked grins and promises to keep me safe. Was this lust or love? How did one know the difference?
As the feeling strengthened, I decided it had to be lust, because how could I love him after such a short period of time? Yes, we’d lived intensely, but did intensity speed up feelings?
As though my thoughts were scrolling across my forehead, his smile vanished in increments and then completely. He jerked up to his feet, kicked sand over the fire, then extended his hand, and just like the dozens of times he’d offered it to me since we’d arrived in the Scourge, I took it.
As we walked to our newest nest, I ran my thumb over every crease and callous, the shape and feel of his palm as familiar to me now as my own. Once inside the round cavern, he lifted my knuckles to his mouth and kissed them chastely.
“I’ll take first watch. You sleep.” He let go, grabbed a few pelts from the pile, shook them out, then layered them over the sand, adding a rolled one at the top of the makeshift bed.
My nerves jangled as though I’d drunk an entire gallon of coffee. “I don’t think I can. Why don’t you sleep, and I take first watch?”
He grabbed his machete and dropped a kiss on the tip of my nose. “I’m used to night watches; you’re not.”
“But—”
“No, buts. Rest.”
“Remo . . .”
He backed out of the cave, and then his footfalls whispered across the sand. Sighing, I laid out on my furred pallet and stared at the pinpricks of white light, which through my lashes almost resembled thelustriumsthat lit up the night sky in Neverra.
Even though they weren’t stars, I wished on them.
I wished Josh had told someone about ourgajoïand then I wished Kingston would choke on his apple and be gone forever.
37
The Tremor
“Amara, get up!”
I grumbled, attempting to twist away from the hands shaking me.
They shook harder. “Amara! Someone just arrived. You have to get up.”
