Chapter 46 #2
He drew abstract shapes around her palm with his thumb.
“I’ve been at his beck and call ever since, but I’m not proud of it.
That’s how he got me to commit to this case.
He promised to put my siblings through school, but it’s not a relationship I boast about.
I do the opposite—keep my family across the isle, keep us out of the public eye.
” He huffed a laugh. “Plus, you seemed so intent on hating me when we met, I didn’t want you to know anything personal about me. ”
Emmeline shook her head. “I certainly judged you before I knew you.”
“Most people do.” He traced a star on her palm, and she shivered.
“I get the feeling you don’t mind what most people think.”
“It doesn’t change who I am. My family is my priority.” Roremar sighed. “But it always bothered me what you thought.”
“What do you mean?”
“Fates, it aggravated me when you called me Reckless. Senseless.” Emmeline’s lungs pinched, and she opened her mouth to apologize, but Roremar waved it off.
“I can’t blame you. I did earn that reputation.
I was reckless in the army, but when you said it, it bothered me more than ever.
I’m not reckless, Emmeline, but I’m willing to do whatever it takes to get what I need. ”
Those words landed with a blow, a promise.
“The benefits have to outweigh the costs,” she whispered, understanding.
Just as she stalked criminals and sent them to their graves, Roremar did what he must to take care of his family.
He pushed boundaries and leaped without nets, but he was three steps ahead of the rest of them.
Those risks were to benefit the people he was responsible for, first in the army, and now his family.
When the cause was so dire, could it be considered reckless at all?
He relied on Falliare now to set up his siblings for a future in which they weren’t beholden to a manipulative uncle. Because that’s exactly what Falliare was doing. Manipulating every last one of them, only no one seemed to acknowledge it aloud. Not even Roremar.
That was something she wasn’t going to touch right now.
“So Falliare funds your family. That’s how you had the horses to get around the isle so easily this entire time?”
“The horses are Aldryn’s, yes, but I rarely use them. I prefer Cirre.”
Her eyes widened, and Roremar laughed. “You ride your pet panther all over the starry isle?”
“She’s not a pet! She’s chosen to live with us, but she belongs to the jungle. And yes, occasionally I do.”
Emmeline blew out a breath. “I didn’t even know you could ride a panther.”
“Most can’t,” Roremar bragged.
She playfully hit his arm, but Roremar caught her hand, eyes heating. “Careful, Huntress,” he warned voice low.
Emmeline bit her lip, fire curling low within her. The same desire she’d felt in the ocean earlier crept up her spine as his eyes dropped to her lips. She leaned an inch further, Roremar’s breathing as ragged as her own, her entire body thrumming with need.
“Emmeline.” Fates, his voice was rough. It trickled down her spine.
Her eyes snapped to his, the silvers reflecting the moon outside the window. It reminded her of starflies on a cloudy night, and—
Starflies. Siena. His family.
They couldn’t do this. She couldn’t allow Roremar any closer. His family needed him too badly, and everyone close to her suffered.
Emmeline swallowed, tugging her hand from his grasp and sitting back. “Cirre has a crescent marking, correct?”
“Yes.” He watched her with desperate eyes, but Emmeline pushed on.
“Did you send her to track me?”
Roremar’s brow creased. “What do you mean?”
“When you and I weren’t speaking, she found me.”
Roremar pursed his lips, finally saying, “No I didn’t. I should have, but I didn’t. Cirre must have done that on her own.” He leaned forward, want jolting through her at his proximity. “And in case you’re wondering, she’s an excellent judge of character.”
The implication lingered in the silence, but Emmeline forced her attention to the window, to the stars. In her terror last night, she’d shoved her magic so far down it hadn’t pushed at her to read since, but the locks were unraveling.
“Come on,” Roremar said as if hearing her thoughts. “Get your things. I’ll walk you back to the Academy.”
Quietly, Emmeline slung her cloak back over her shoulders and gathered what she needed. They discussed the new information from Falliare on the walk, both of their suspicions turning toward the Snake Charmer since the latest victim worked at the Mezzanine.
“I don’t think he’s guilty,” Emmeline said as they crept through the corridors of the Academy. “But I find it difficult to believe he doesn’t know something if this is at his door.”
“We can talk to him again, too.” In a gravelly, threatening mumble Roremar added, “In the public hall.”
Relief and gratitude fluttered through her at his protective tone.
When they reached her door, Emmeline faced Roremar and finally voiced the question that had been poised on her tongue all evening. “Why do you feel you must do it on your own?”
He sighed, thumb once again dragging stars across her palm. “I promised to take care of them. I wouldn’t be doing that if I let Nico kill himself the way I am or let my sister come home to take some low-level job here instead of living her dream on the continent.”
“And what about you?” Emmeline asked softly.
Roremar gave her a sad, crooked smirk as he leaned a shoulder against the door, the moonlight streaming through the windows carving his features into an image worthy of museums. “I’m tied to this isle, Emmeline.
No matter what, I will always have to be here.
May as well spend my time this way.” He paused.
“Do you know what I see when I look at you?”
“What?” She barely breathed, heart fluttering as Roremar brushed her hair behind her ear. His thumb lingered against her jaw.
“I see the freest person I’ve ever known.”
Emmeline pressed her back to the wall, staring at the tapestry opposite her door. “I’m not free. I’m alone.”
“You’re not,” Roremar asserted. “No matter where you go after this, you’ll have me—and my family. I think my sisters and mother fell in love with you today. Truthfully, Leo probably did, too.”
Her eyes stung, the tapestry blurring as longing splintered through her. She rolled her head to face him. “That may be, but I’m always searching for answers. For her.”
“Maybe you’re searching, but you’re unburdened in a way no one I’ve met is. Like you belong to the stars.”
Belong.
That image shattered the illusion of herself in her mind.
This hollowed out, isolated person who lived behind stained glass.
What if she’d been looking into someone else’s cage all this time, but the view was sprawling at her heels?
What if by embracing this isolation, she’d set herself free long ago?
Roremar looked at her with an intensity that said he wanted to keep her here, but that he wouldn’t dare. It made her heart race, her palms sweaty, to be so transparent.
She’d fought so hard to keep everyone away, but for the first time, with those steel eyes on her and all her wounds ripped wide, she wasn’t sure if untethered was what she should be fighting to be.
“Sometimes I think I might,” she confessed on a whisper, not elaborating. “Goodnight, Reckless.”
Despite everything he told her tonight, his lips curled at the name, like her use of it now was a secret between them, sealing over all the ones they’d traded.
Stepping closer so the toes of his boots touched hers, Roremar pressed his lips to her forehead, the words “Goodnight, Huntress” sinking into her skin.
And for once, she didn’t feel so alone.