18. Grier
Grier
Ikeep us to the servants’ corridors and out of sight. The castle is quiet at this hour, with most of the staff already asleep, but I don’t trust the quiet. Quiet is where questions start, and I can’t afford questions tonight.
Ryewood had barely disappeared down the garden steps when the King pulled me aside.
“Your discretion has been sufficient until now. But you’ve allowed this situation to become visible,” the King had said. His hand rested on the stone railing as he spoke, fingers relaxed and unmoved. “The arrangement now requires revision.”
Arrangement, as if Gemma were a piece placed incorrectly.
“You will be present for all training sessions,” he continued. “No exceptions. You will submit daily reports on Ryewood’s training to Voss. Oversight will be transferred if required.” His head tilted toward the gardens. “Now go fix this.”
After the gardens, I’d gone to find her so she wouldn’t have to face the fallout alone.
She opened the door, and the look on her face stopped me cold. It was a quiet devastation, like something had broken past the point of pain.
She walks in silence now. That’s what worries me most. Gemma is never silent; she’s fire and sharp edges, but right now she’s a shell.
I know how this happened. I saw it. Under the willow tree, his hands buried in her hair, her whole body melting into him without the guard she keeps with me, like she forgot why she put distance between them in the first place.
I don’t think I’ll ever unsee it. It sits in my chest like a blade I can’t pull out.
The night air is sharp and cold. I glance at her again. Those beautiful eyes are fixed ahead, seeing nothing, or maybe seeing everything, replaying it the way I am.
What does she need?
The question loops through me with every step.
I’ve spent years learning how to read people, how to anticipate threats before they materialize, how to position myself between danger and the ones I’ve sworn to protect.
But this isn’t a threat I can meet with steel.
I can’t put my sword through heartbreak.
I glance at her again. She’s shivering, not dramatically, just small tremors running through her shoulders. She doesn’t even seem to realize it. She’s too deep inside her own head for the cold to even reach her.
I shrug off my jacket and drape it over her shoulders. She blinks and looks up at me like she’s returning from somewhere far away.
“Thanks, Grier,” she says, her voice hollow.
But she pulls the jacket tighter, and the weight in my chest lifts, just slightly.
I wrap my arm around her shoulders, and she comes easily, too easily.
We keep walking until The Barrel’s familiar silhouette comes into view.
When we step inside, her mask will go back on.
This real version of her, broken and quiet, will vanish.
But for these last few steps, she’s here, unguarded and pressed into my side.
And for a moment, I let myself be weak enough to think, mine, even if she doesn’t know it. Even if she never will.
I press my lips to the top of her head. She doesn’t react, but I needed it. Needed something to hold onto before I let her go.
We reach The Mossy Barrel, and Gemma pauses at the threshold.
I watch her shoulders shift, watch the moment she finds her mask.
It’s always been one of the things I admire most about her, how fast she can become unbreakable.
I’ve seen her hold it together for terrified children all the way to safety, then break apart in a back alley after they were gone. Tonight it makes my whole chest ache.
I offer my arm and guide her inside. Despite the late hour, the tavern still holds a crowd, millers, a few merchants, and couples too wrapped up in each other to notice anything else. It smells like ale and wood smoke from whatever Fletcher cooked earlier. It smells like comfort.
“Corner booth,” I say.
I walk her over, then head for the bar.
Fletcher’s already clocked us. His eyes flick to Gemma, then to the dress. He slides into his usual theatrics, with his arms wide, voice booming, and exaggerated charm. The same harmless flirting he’s been throwing her way for years.
Gemma gives him a smile that looks real, and she loosens. I wish I didn’t hate that it takes another man to do it. But I’m not stupid. Fletcher is safe, he’s home, he’s everything she had before castles and princes complicated everything.
Fletcher dips back behind the bar, and I return to the booth with a bottle and two glasses I didn’t bother asking for.
For a while, we drink in comfortable silence, and the waitress drops off two meat pies Fletcher clearly sent.
Color starts to return to her as she eats.
“You were right,” she says quietly. “This is helping. Getting out of the castle.”
Her hand rests on my arm, and I go still, not because I want to, but because I don’t trust what I’ll do if I move.
“Thank you,” she adds, and then she pulls her hand back far too soon.
“Anytime. You know that.”
We drink. The whiskey warms her from the inside out, and I can see it happening, the way her shoulders soften and the hollow look in her eyes dulls.
I let myself watch, probably more than I should.
This is the part that always gets me. Not the fire or the sharp edges, but this quieter version of her. The part of her that always slips through my fingers.
Around us, the tavern thins. Chairs scrape back, coins clink onto tables. Millers drift toward the door, laughter fading as they go. Fletcher starts wiping down the bar, slower now, stealing glances our way. Last call isn’t far off.
“It’s getting late,” she says, though she doesn’t move.
I swirl the whiskey in my glass, watching the amber catch the light, buying myself a moment.
I’ve lived years inside the space between want and don’t. Years of wanting her and knowing better. Years of being the steady place she lands when everything else burns. If I ask, I risk breaking that. If I don’t, I don’t let myself finish the thought.
“We don’t have to go back tonight,” I say carefully. Like I’m offering a bed, not a life.
Her eyes lift. For a beat, she just looks at me, like she’s really taking me in. Not through me or past me, but at me, like something has shifted in the way she sees me.
“Okay,” she says quietly.
The word lands in my chest like a crack of light, splitting open want and hope I’ve spent years trying to bury.
“Okay,” I echo, voice rough.
Her hand finds mine across the table, and I curl her fingers into mine like that will keep her from vanishing.
I guide her down the familiar streets toward my place, stealing glances at her while hope spikes dangerously.
I try not to get ahead of myself, but it’s hard not to.
Hard not to let myself imagine what this could mean, what it could become.
All those nights I’ve had her in my bed, I’ve never let myself believe it was anything more than what she offered, a release, a distraction, two bodies in the dark and nothing else. But tonight feels different.
My flat comes into view, and I pull out my key with my free hand, not willing to let go of her with the other. The door sticks, like it always does. I shoulder it open and step aside to let her in first.
She moves past me, and I catch her familiar floral scent beneath the smoke from the tavern and the lingering smell of my jacket on her shoulders. I breathe it in and commit it to memory.
I light a candle on the table by the door.
The flame catches, throwing soft golden light across the room.
My place isn’t much, with a bed against one wall, a small table with two chairs, a trunk where I keep my things, and a bathing room through the door in the corner.
It’s simple. I spend most nights in the guards’ quarters at the castle, but this place is just mine.
She stands in the middle of the room, arms wrapped around herself. She looks almost vulnerable, and so different from the sharp-edged woman who commands every room she walks into.
I want to go to her, pull her into me, kiss her, and brand her mine. Instead, I move to the trunk and pull out a clean shirt.
“You’ll be more comfortable in this,” I say, holding it out to her.
She doesn’t turn away, just holds my gaze as her hands move to my jacket and slides it off her shoulders. It falls to the floor with a soft thud.
My heart slams against my ribs.
Her fingers reach for the laces at the back of her dress, but she can’t quite reach them. She turns, giving me her back, and looks at me over her shoulder, the request clear.
My feet carry me to her, and I stop just behind her, close enough that I can feel her without touching her.
I’ve undressed her before, but never like this, never this slow, never with her standing so still and trusting.
The only sound is our breathing and the soft whisper of silk as I work each lace free, taking my time, savoring every inch.
She holds her dress from falling and turns back around to face me. Her eyes find mine and hold them, and then she pushes the silk down slowly, letting it slide over her hips, down her thighs, until it pools at her feet, and she’s left only in her underwear.
My chest is so tight I can barely breathe. She’s standing there, not hiding, not putting up any of those walls she usually keeps between us. She’s letting me see her, all of her.
“Gemma.” Her name comes out reverent.
She closes the distance between us, her hands finding my chest, fingers curling into the fabric of my shirt. She looks up at me with those beautiful eyes, the request clear.
I couldn’t deny her if I wanted.
I wrap my hands around her face and pull her mouth to mine. She tastes like whiskey and her. Her lips part for me, soft and willing, and I lose myself in her. I’ve imagined it a thousand times but never let myself believe I could have her like this.
Her fingers work at the buttons of my shirt, impatient and hungry. I help her, shrugging it off, and when her palms press flat against my bare chest, I shudder.
“Grier.” She breathes my name against my lips.