Page 35 of A Fragile Enchantment

His gaze caught on her extinguished lantern. “It helps if you light it.”

That snapped her out of her stupor. “Your Highness,” she protested in a stage whisper. “You shouldn’t be here.”

“I’m reading,” he said bemusedly, “in a library.”

“Yes, well…” She floundered. “What I mean is, we shouldn’t be alone together.”

He seemed to consider it. “Why not?”

“You…!” She huffed, then cut herself off. She stalked closer so that she didn’t have to feel foolish whisper-shouting across the room. “You know very well why.”

“Nothing comes to mind.”

She threw her hands up. “You’re making fun of me now.”

“It’s the middle of the night,” he replied coolly.Exactly,she might have interjected, but he continued, “No one is here to gossip. If I feel like speaking to you, why shouldn’t I?”

She suddenly felt quite warm. “You want to speak to me?”

“Is that a problem?” She thought she detected a touch of self-consciousness in the hastiness of his reply.

Yes.Of course it was. A gossip columnist had already writtenabout them—vaguely, and to question the source of the rumor, yes, but the point stood. Rosa’s father already disapproved of him. His brother had threatened to hunt down the girl Kit had been seen with at the ball. Now that she’d washed her hands of Lovelace’s scheme, all she wanted was to finish her work in peace. No more complications, no more distractions.

But the longer she stared at him, that almost boyish hesitation on his face laid bare in the candlelight, it occurred to her that he must’ve been quite lonely here. Why else would someone like him want to speak to someone like her? For her own sake, she should tell him to call on Sinclair and leave her alone. But, well…

Maybe she was a little lonely, too.

The realization settled heavily over her. Erin, her last friend in Caterlow, had left a year ago. It hadn’t sunk in that she hadn’t spoken to someone her own age in that long. What had she even done with herself besideswork?

“If you insist,” she said, trying for a playful tone, “then I should apologize.”

Surprise skittered across his face. “For what?”

“I know you wanted me to forget that we spoke last night, but I cannot. I probably would have lost this job—or worse—if you hadn’t done what you did.”

Shame lodged itself within her, as sudden and sharp as an arrow to the heart. If she’d been strong enough to ignore the court’s petty cruelty, he never would have had to humiliate himself in front of the people he so disdained to protect her. He never would have been dressed down like a child in his brother’s office. Oh, how she hated herself for that moment of weakness, for burdening Kit with all her silly hurt feelings. She took care of others; she did not ask to be cared for. What good was she otherwise?

“I am so sorry for the trouble I caused you,” she said. “I shouldn’t have—”

“Shouldn’t have what?” His tone held no mockery, but it wassharp enough to cut. “Been standing on a balcony? Drawing breath?”

She had no reply to that. Niamh tore her gaze away from the floor to meet his. The intensity of it bowled her over. His eyes, blazing in the dark of the library, seared her like daybreak.

“Save your apologies for when they actually matter,” he said. “You didn’t make me do anything.”

It unsettled her, for an apology to be so summarily refused. Niamh had spent all of her life sorry for taking up space, guilty for inconveniencing anyone with her emotions or needs. She supposed she had often felt tempted to apologize for breathing, but no one had ever made her feel so absurd for it. It stung as much as it relieved her, but she should have expected no different from a man so disagreeable to all polite society. Kit, she imagined, had never once apologized for existing exactly as he was.

“Then I shall have to thank you instead,” she said quietly, “for your kindness.”

“Kindness?” He looked thoroughly discomfited by the suggestion—even disgusted. “It’s nothing like that. My body works faster than my mind.”

How eager he was to deny even the smallest of good qualities in himself. It made Niamh smile. The urge to tease him rose up within her quicker than she could quash it. “That is quite a noble instinct you have, Your Highness.”

Most impulsive men acted to sate their own appetites, pursuing pleasures or indulging cruelties. Yet here was Kit, impulsively self-destructing to protect someone else from harm. Because thatwasit, wasn’t it? That grim, resigned look he’d worn last night—that reckless abandon—did not belong to someone who cared nothing for anyone but himself.

“It isn’t, believe me.” He spoke so coldly, she sensed she’d offended him.

“Your Highness, I…”