38. Penny #2
Kit shrugged one shoulder. “A bit. ”
He had yet to release my hand, and I wondered if he realized he was still holding on. It may have been testing my luck, but I rolled my hand over so I could press my palm against his and weave our fingers together.
Kit responded by tightening his grip. “He’s right. You are quite handsome.”
My breath hitched. “You... You think so?”
He nipped at his lip again, but barely a second passed before he admitted, “I do.”
I felt sick in the best possible way.
If I hadn’t already been sitting, I would have needed to then. Under the table, I feared my knees were knocking, and it was all I could do to squeak out a question.
“What else do you think about me?”
Kit huffed a laugh. I expected him to change the subject, to get up and check the beans slowly simmering or insist we needed coffee right that minute. But he stayed, holding my hand tight while pressing his leg into mine.
“I think about...” He looked out the window, taking a moment to gather his thoughts.
“Staying up half the night talking, how excited you get to show me your leatherworking, how this house never felt like home until I lived in it with you. I never minded silence or solitude before you came along. Now, I can’t stand it, like something is missing anytime we’re apart. ”
“I feel that way, too,” I murmured, then cursed myself for interrupting, but Kit just smiled.
“Lately, I’ve been thinking a lot about the time you kissed me.”
My eyes stretched wide as I stared at him, this gorgeous man telling me I was handsome, admitting he thought about me, maybe even in the way I thought about him. And the kiss… the thing I’d almost convinced myself to regret …
“You have?” My voice was a rasp.
Kit nodded. “I think I’d like to try it again.”
My thoughts slowed while I sat there, anchored by Kit’s grip and failing to comprehend the meaning behind his words. But I didn’t have to wonder long.
He leaned forward, half-rising from his chair and sliding his free hand around the nape of my neck. It was the gentlest touch, cradling the back of my head while he pressed his lips against mine.
A sound of surprise escaped me, but Kit didn’t retreat. The kiss deepened, and I surged up into him, pushing us both to standing. I pulled on his hand, guiding it to my side. I needed to be closer than the kitchen table allowed. I wanted to touch him, feel him, hold him…
I rubbed my palms down his arms, then around his ribs. My fingers dug into his back and made his breath catch. He clung onto me, his hands hot on my bare skin, his lips pillowy soft.
We made awkward progress toward the couch in the living room while stealing kisses all the way. He tasted divine.
When we reached the sofa, we tumbled onto it. Kit laid back against the armrest and I climbed onto his lap. He raked his hands through my hair as I dipped low, arching carefully to avoid brushing my branded chest against his.
I kissed him the way I’d longed to for weeks, savoring the soft crush of his mouth and flicking my tongue inside.
He gasped at that, and the sound caused familiar warmth to travel to my groin.
My member stiffened inside my trousers, needful, and every touch further fueled my desire.
Kit’s hands slid down to my waist, and I spread my legs on either side of his, rolling my hips against him as I pressed in .
His breaths came faster, and he let out a groan that took on the shape of my name.
“Pen…”
My next kiss quieted him, and I rocked forward again. His grip on my sides tightened.
I pinched his lip between my teeth and sucked, relishing one last moment before he gave a push that set me back. Retreating, I rested on his thighs and stared down to find him flushed and his eyes fully black from the swell of his pupils.
His chest fluttered as he smoothed his palm across his crotch to hide the sudden bulge there. It was as clear a declaration as any, something he couldn't deny.
I stared, slack-jawed, until I mustered the presence of mind to speak.
“Kit, you do fancy me.”
Blush burned his cheeks, deep red through the stubble there. He shifted backward to sit more upright, working his way into the corner of the sofa. When he was finally settled, he gave the slightest nod, looking more sheepish than I’d ever seen him.
“That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you.”
His gaze skated over my shirtless torso with an interest I now recognized. How many times had he looked at me that way, and I'd missed it? Or passed it off as his attentive nature and nothing more?
Elation swelled my heart so fully I thought I might float away. I marveled at him, thinking back over the weeks since I'd met him in Forstford.
Had I always thought him as dashing as he was in this moment?
I would have kissed him again, to reassure myself this wasn't a wishful dream, but my thoughts traveled back over those same weeks, recalling the time I'd spent pining and the hopes that had nearly been dashed.
Scowling, I swatted his arm. “Godsdamned man! You had me thinking I’d gone mad!”
Kit laid his hand over where I’d smacked him. “I’ve been thinking the same thing,” he said.
“That I’m mad?”
“That I am.”
The mood had changed to something more serious.
I scooted backward off Kit’s legs and settled beside him.
Before, I’d been careful not to crowd, always leaving a bit of space between us.
This time, he closed that gap, draping his arm over my shoulders and pulling me against his side.
His thumb brushed the top of my arm, then trailed up my neck and past my ear to twirl through the shaggy locks of my hair.
The delicate touches made me shiver, and my erection throbbed. But I did my best to ignore it, letting my thoughts race ahead to other things. No sooner had they moved on than did something crop up so abruptly I felt like I mentally tripped over it.
“Is that why you didn’t tell Merrick?” I wondered aloud. “It’s too difficult to believe you’re taken with me?”
Kit shook his head. “It’s not difficult at all. That’s the problem…”
I frowned, and he shook his head again.
“No, it’s not a problem. I’m… not explaining myself well.” He rubbed his free hand over his face, and his next words came out muffled through his palm. “I didn’t tell your brother?—”
“ Half -brother,” I corrected.
Kit sighed loudly. “I know that.” His hand fell away, and his forehead creased with frustration before he spoke again.
“I didn’t tell him because our private business is none of his.
You deserved to hear this from me, not as a hasty declaration thrown in Merrick’s face. In fact, I’d prefer he never knew?—”
“And let him keep thinking I’m a hopeless fool?” I grabbed Kit’s hand and squeezed it painfully tight. “He’ll know. I’ll tell him myself.” My attempted surge to standing was stopped by Kit’s arm anchoring me to his side.
“Penny, you can’t,” he sputtered, suddenly frantic.
“Why can’t I?”
“Please, trust me. It’s safer this way, and there’s nothing I want more than to keep you safe. I wouldn’t risk you for anything…” He trailed off, and the look of fear that haunted his eyes told me the danger was real, at least to him.
“All right.” I dipped my chin in a nod. “But I want you to know I’m proud to be with you, Kit. I’d have you on my arm anywhere. In front of anyone.”
Kit’s features relaxed. “Thank you.” He reached for me again, pulling me in for another gentle kiss.
I softened against him, tucking under the crook of his arm and letting my head roll onto the uninjured side of his chest. We sat in quiet while I considered the events of the day.
So much had happened, and I struggled to make sense of it all.
There had been so much bad, but being here, held close the way I’d dreamed of for weeks—and years before that—I felt the good most of all.
“You’re home late. Did you stop and talk to Levitt?” I asked at length.
Kit hummed affirmation. “He was sorry about the raid, but said it went as he expected. He knew they wouldn’t find anything.”
“Just wasting everyone’s time, then,” I grumbled, picking at a loose thread in the knee of Kit’s trousers.
“I don’t think it was a waste entirely,” he replied. “ Merrick lost quite a bit of favor. The more that happens, the less likely he’ll keep whatever support he has. If he continues like this, he may lose everything.”
I pushed upright and swiveled to face him. “What does that mean?”
Kit glanced aside, ordering his thoughts the way he did when he felt the need to speak carefully.
“He and Levitt have the Death Watch divided. Levitt has a vision for the Bone Men, but Merrick and his supporters stand in the way of that. It’s possible, if Merrick steps far enough out of line, he could be ousted. ”
“They wouldn’t kill him, would they?”
No matter how awful Merrick was to me, or how greatly he despised me, I didn't wish him dead. My father's passing had been loss enough.
Kit shook his head, unsettling his raven curls. “No. Merrick's role would merely be reduced. Levitt would find something else to do with him, and someone else would take his place.”
Slowly, I relaxed, easing into Kit again and pulling his arm back around me. With the sun retreating and the fireplace unlit, a chill had invaded the house. I could have retrieved my shirt, but I enjoyed the feeling of Kit’s skin on mine and the excuse to let him warm me inside and out.
I considered his statement, but he seemed more pleased about the idea of Merrick's removal than I was. I still had doubts.
“How do we know the new Shroud Warden won’t be more rotten than Merrick is?” I asked.
In profile, I saw Kit's lips quirk a grin. “Do you think I’m rotten?”
“You?”
Kit nodded. “Given my father’s former position and my friendship with Levitt, I may have a chance to fill that role once my Oaths are complete.”
Imagining Kit prancing around in Merrick’s fancy robes, taking an office in the Ossuary, and overseeing new recruits as they were branded in the name of a cruel god made me uneasy.
I liked things the way they were. More than that, I liked Kit the way he was.
My mother touted the adage that power corrupts.
I wondered if that was what happened to Kit's father and to Merrick.
If this place was as cursed as I'd been told it was, perhaps that was how its infection spread.
I grabbed Kit's hand again and reveled in the fact that he didn't pull away. But even that victory failed to alleviate my growing concern.
“I thought you wanted to destroy the cult,” I mumbled, “not run it.”
Kit snorted a breath. “I want to run it into the ground . To do that, I need to be at or near the helm.”
Worries mounted and multiplied. I wanted to go back to a few minutes prior when we were tangled up in each other, those moments of bliss. Now, the happiness I'd barely glimpsed felt tenuous.
“But if Levitt finds out…” I swallowed. “You’ll be so close to him. If he realizes what we’re planning…”
Kit used his grip around my shoulders to turn me till we were face to face. His eyes were dark, deep, and wholly earnest. “We can prepare for all of that. We have time.”
“How much time?”
“We promised your mother and Sayla you’d be back for spring planting,” Kit replied as though nothing had changed. But this changed everything.
I shook my head. “That’s not long enough. Violette said it takes nine months to finish the Oaths. You told me it took your father years. ”
“You're right,” Kit admitted and seemed to sink further into the corner of the couch. His gaze roamed toward the dark fireplace, then through it, fixing on a distant nothing.
I looked with him, squirming in the uncomfortable silence until he spoke again. “But my father became a Sentinel early on, long before he finished his Oaths.” The revelation was more for himself than me, but I made sense enough of it.
Pulling his arm away, Kit stood and dodged the coffee table on his way to the hearth. He crouched beside it where I'd stashed his father's collection of journals on the bottom shelf. Scooping a few of the older ones into his arms, Kit turned toward me.
“If there’s a precedent, we may have a case to make to Levitt.” His expression was near a smile. Relieved. Hopeful. He didn't look that way often. I was glad enough to see it that I managed not to grumble as he heaped the leather-bound tomes on the table before me.
“I'll put some coffee on,” he said once they were all in neat piles. “You can finish up the bread, then we can eat and get into these. They may have the proof we need.”
Better coffee than whiskey, I thought as he bustled to the kitchen.
But that would come, along with a somber mood.
He broke his own heart every time he looked at those books, and I couldn’t stand to see him hurt.
I ached for my home and wanted to return more than ever, but I couldn’t leave Kit alone here.
Imagining him ascending the Bone Men’s ranks made me wonder if my attempt to retrieve my father’s remains was turning into another kind of rescue mission entirely.