Christian stared at her as though he were attempting to detect mockery—and finding none.
“You cannot mean that.”
“It is like a painting—rich colour against pale stone. It is also part of you.” Her voice did not waver. “And I have seen nothing in you thus far that is monstrous.”
His chest rose and fell more slowly now—but deeper. The hand at his throat lowered a fraction.
“Miss Hart. You should not speak so carelessly.”
“I am not careless.” Her tone softened. “I am observant.”
He looked away first.
That small surrender altered something between them.
She took one step forward.
“Miss Hart,” he said again, but there was less command in it now. More warning. “This is not a spectacle for your curiosity.”
“It is not curiosity.”
Her voice dropped—steadier now, not reckless but resolved.
“It is… admiration.”
His breath caught at that.
She saw it. The precise moment the word struck.
“You do not know what you say.”
“I know exactly.” She tilted her head slightly. “You move as though the world has taught you to make yourself smaller. It has not succeeded.”
Another step. Close enough now to feel the heat radiating from his skin.
He did not retreat.
But he was very still.
“Fiona,” he said quietly.
Her given name upon his tongue felt neither like courtesy nor command. It sounded unfamiliar there—careful, almost reverent—as though he were testing its shape and discovering it to be something perilous.
Her name had altered in his mouth.
No longer a warning.
A plea.
“I have spent my life being looked at,” he continued, voice tightening, “as though I were something to endure.”
“Well… I am not enduring you.”
That did it.
Not the word ‘beautiful’.
Not admiration.
