I raise my eyes to him. Ari is smiling at me. He has stopped laughing. I smile back, noting a tension filling the quiet after our laughing fit. I lick my lips to moisten them, repositioning my body into a more… desirable pose.
“Thanks for the food,” I say in my lightest, sweetest voice. So much talk of me shitting—I need a new angle on my femininity.
“A true pleasure,” he replies.
His eyes are soft but colored with intensity. He’s picked up on the energy between us. Like a stick bent to the point where it will almost snap. Almost.
Without taking his eyes off me, Ari takes my gourd—tiny in his hands—and fills my cup, then his. I crack a smile and speak in an innocent tone.
“You are very caring and gallant, for a Jotnar giant.”
“Where I am soft with you, I am hard with others.”
Our eyes lock. An open remark. He wants to be soft with me. I have noticed, and when I think of it, he has been soft with me at every turn. The strawberry fields, the pants, cooking, saving my life, drying me off. And now this. I’ve been the belligerent one. The one resisting. I’ve been the one causing problems. Problems like Njord.
I bury the thought quickly.
“I have noticed, Ari.”
“I’m happy you have.”
“I’m happy you have chosen me to be soft with.” I lean over the table. Risky—saying he has chosen me. If I’m being honest, I’m also fishing to see if he has other ladies he charms to the clouds. Girls I could murder, perhaps.
“This may sound stupid, Kilda, but?—”
“It isn’t stupid,” I interrupt him, leaning farther.
He raises a playful eyebrow as he leans closer to me.
“You haven’t even heard me speak.”
“Okay, say it then,” I insist with a wave of my hand and a silly smile.
“Through your armored walls, through your blades of iron, I have always seen your glittering spark.”
My heart jumps. Never has a man spoken to me in this manner. Perhaps he is more than a troll giant, perhaps he really is a poet. I snicker but control it quickly.
“Go on,” I whisper.
“The world is cold, the night is harsh?—”
“That’s what I always think, cold and harsh! I always…” I stop, seeing him shake his head at my interruption. “Oh, sorry.”
He sighs with a grin.
“A cold world with a harsh night, but your beating heart is what makes the sun rise. It’s the shining beacon of hope.”
“Oh you! You go too far!” I laugh, smacking my hands on the table. “You say that to all the girls!”
He places a hand on mine. A ripple roars through me. My senses come alive.
“I wouldn’t say it if I didn’t mean it,” he says, keeping his eyes locked onto mine.
The man’s expression is no longer playful. No laughter in the air—only crackling energy between his blue eyes and mine.
“Are you serious?” I whisper.
“I saw it in you, Kilda,” he says. “I also saw, to my great pleasure, your plump plums hanging low from their tree.”
