Cillian smirked like this was all some funny game, and Wolfe stood beside me. “Niamh just needed to warm up after taking a dip in the Smithen Pond. I offered her a seat by my fire, and we nodded off at some point.”
“Sounds practical,” Cillian said, eyes twinkling in a way I didn’t understand.
Did he not see what was happening here? Did he not get that I was falling for his stupid, grumpy brother? He was almost as clueless as Wolfe, which was infuriating. The Wolfgang brothers might very well have been the death of me.
“All warmed up now,” I lied, freezing without the heat of Wolfe’s body against mine. “And actually, I need to be going. We have a party at the library tonight.” Then because my brain still wasn’t working properly, I turned to Wolfe. “Are you coming?”
His eyebrows shot up in surprise. “No?—”
“Of course he is,” Cillian interrupted. “I need my guard by my side. Lots of people, lots of opportunities for mischief.”
“Great,” I said, my voice three pitches higher than normal. “Well, I have to get going.”You already said that, Niamh.“No need to come with me,” I said to both brothers, holding out my hands as they moved to follow. The very last thing I wanted was the most awkward stroll through town in history. “I’m sure you two have a lot of things to talk about. Brotherly things.”
I turned abruptly, marching down the hill and wishing it would swallow me up.
“You’re extra jumpy today.”Morton’s tail curled around a thick maroon ribbon that stretched from one wall to the other in front of the large back window.
We were almost done decorating the library for the party. Since Wolfe had found the library, we’d had more visitors. People stopped by daily to ask when they’d be able to check out a book, the excitement in town palpable. Cillian had been right. This was exactly what Fairwitch had needed.
A book flew over my head and straight toward the shelf, lodging between two other books. “Oh no!” I marched to the book and yanked it out. “I told you, you’re not a romance.” It kept putting itself in the romance section. “Yes, you have a romance, but you can’t call yourself that if both characters die at the end.”
“Spoiler!” Morton yelled.
I shot a stern look at the book. “You are a tragedy. Accept it already.” The book rustled in my hands. “Well, I’m sorry, but you haven’t been read in a long time, so you don’t realize how rabidromance readers are. If they pick you up, they’ll be expecting a happy ending. They might get so angry they throw you.”
The book shuddered, going still.
I walked toward a shelf in the back, squinting at all the little numbers and letters Morton and I had used to label the books, then found the right spot and put the book where it belonged. “Now, promise me you won’t move again.” The book rustled but didn’t attempt to fly out of the shelf, so I turned and walked back into the large main area of the library, plopping into one of the cushy chairs we’d recovered with a nice soft green fabric. Weeks of work had come together, and now it was officially time to open. I was both excited and nervous.
“Are you avoiding me?” Morton’s head poked up over the side of the chair, and I jumped, putting my hand over my heart. “See?” Morton’s black eyes widened and he pointed his tail at me. “You are jumpy!”
“Well, she’s probably tired.” Margaret appeared in one of the newer paintings we’d hung, books stacked on a table with a bowl of fruit, Margaret’s upper half now blocking the lovely image. “She didn’t come back to the castle until early this morning.”
“Thank you, Margaret,” I gritted out.
“What?” Morton asked. “Where were you all night?”
“I heard she spent the night at Wolfe’s cabin. Poor thing got cold and had to be warmed.”
I rolled my eyes. “Margaret, don’t you have other things to be doing right now?”
She frowned. “Not really. I’m just a painting, you know.”
I sighed and rubbed my temples.
“You spent the night in Wolfe’s cabin?” Morton yelled.
“It wasn’t in his cabin,” I hissed. “And it was an accident. I was cold, and we were by the fire?—”
“You were by a fire?” Morton yelled even louder.
“What?” Margaret asked. “What’s wrong with a fire?”
I groaned. “Wolfe is trying to help me overcome my fear of fires,and so we were sitting by one, and I was practicing breathing and chanting and Wolfe was telling me a story?—”
“Wolfe told you a story?” Morton yelled even louder. “That oaf uttered enough words to make a whole story?”
I flicked him. “Will you stop doing that? Yes, he told me a story, and I fell asleep, and then I guess he fell asleep, too, and we woke up this morning and I came back here.”
