Chapter 17 #2
“Just Fennor, please.” He holds out a hand for me to shake. “I’ll be honest with you, Miss Storme. I went into this weekend ready to give up, but you reminded me why I’ve stood my ground for as long as I have.”
Warmth settles in my chest, driving away many of my doubts. I didn’t realize he’d paid any attention to me. “How did I do that?”
He smiles. “With the prince madly in love with you, you could be living a life of luxury, and instead you choose to protect people who couldn’t care less who you are. It’s more inspiring than you might think, and I’ve needed a reminder of the man I want to be.”
With the prince madly in love with you. I should focus more on the other things he said, but those words are the ones that stick, repeating through my mind and leaving me almost dizzy.
I’ve always known that fantasy to be impossible, and yet there was something in the way the prince looked at me last night that pushed right past my defenses and made me think, just maybe, my love for him might not be unrequited for much longer.
I shove those thoughts as deep as I can before I start to think they might be real.
Instead, I decide to trust Fennor with a bit of my soul, the way he trusted me with a bit of his.
“Sometimes I wonder if I made the wrong choice, leaving the queen’s side,” I say quietly.
“Would I have been more useful protecting her directly like I did before?” It’s a risk, insinuating that I’m still protecting her, but I’d guess Fennor already has his suspicions of my real occupation.
Just as I’m pretty sure Fennor is firmly in opposition to the anti-royalists.
“Sometimes I wonder if I’m only ever good for throwing house parties,” Fennor says with a shrug.
He slides his hands into his pockets, looking so casual that I wouldn’t have guessed he was a marquess if I didn’t already know it.
“We all have insecurities, don’t we? I suppose if we try to be better than we were yesterday, we’ll turn out alright. ”
“Let’s hope,” I say right as two staff members arrive with our bags.
“Good luck.” The surprising lord gives one last smile and offers his hand to help me into the car, and once the luggage is stowed in the boot, we’re on our way.
When the car has made it down the lane and out of sight of Fennor’s estate, I expect Hex to sit up and drop the act. He doesn’t. “Your strategy worked,” I tell him. “Fennor all but confirmed he’s loyal to the crown and that Blackmere is not. Well done.”
He grunts and presses his fingers to his temples, his eyes closed and his head tilted away from the light of the window.
My jaw drops, and I stare at the man as reality hits me. “You’re actually hungover!”
He winces and leans away from me. “It doesn’t take much,” he admits and touches his forehead to the window. “The first drink was to keep Blackmere from thinking I suspect him. The second was a gesture of camaraderie. The third…” He groans.
I match the sound, trying not to imagine the kinds of things he might have said under the influence. “Was getting drunk really the best idea?”
“What happened to my excellent strategy?” he grumbles.
“It would have been a strategy if you were pretending to be drunk.”
“You try pretending to drink with a bloke like Blackmere staring you down. The whiskey had to go somewhere.”
I gape at him, horrified that he would let his guard down like that. “How can you be sure that you didn’t reveal the whole bloody mission to him?”
A tiny smirk lifts the corner of his mouth as he peeks at me. “I’ve never heard you talk like that.”
I punch him in the arm. “Hex!”
Groaning again, he drops his head against the back of the seat and shuts his eyes once more. “I didn’t talk about the mission, Astrid.”
His use of my first name isn’t as pleasant as it was last night, and I have to take several deep breaths so I don’t snap at him. In the closet, it felt intimate; this morning it feels like he has completely forgotten who he is. “What did you talk about?”
He grunts. “How you are far too busy trying to save the world to bother falling for a lout like me.”
Is that why Fennor thinks I snubbed him? “Hex, how is that not talking about the mission?”
His half-hearted shrug makes my blood boil with frustration.
“There are plenty of ways to save the world that don’t involve the RIA, Storme.
And I can guarantee the gossip mill already believes you and I are romantically involved after the way we’ve acted this weekend, so I’ve given you a way out of it.
” He shifts in his seat, getting more comfortable and apparently oblivious to the way I’m staring at him.
“A way out?” I repeat.
“Of a relationship with me. It’s better for us both.”
He told me on our first night that nothing he did would be real, but somehow I forgot that warning.
So what? Every little touch and soft look was just for show?
Before Crowell found us, we were on our own in that closet, and he can’t argue that almost kissing me was a way to keep up pretenses. That was real.
But it’s looking painfully clear that he doesn’t want it to be real.
“Wake me up when we get to Invem,” Hex mumbles, and only moments later, he falls asleep. Leaving me with my disappointment, my heartache, and none of the answers I was hoping he would have.
Maybe he hasn’t changed as much as I thought.