“You are right, no doubt. Though it seems a shame.”
Mirrie could hardly catch her breath. “I shall go back downstairs.” She crossed her arms to stop herself from trembling.
“Nay, do not go.” He pushed back a shock of golden hair and stood with one hand cupped around his neck. “I had the idea we were both enjoying it.”
Darn him and his unshakable confidence.
“Was I mistaken?” he asked softly, his eyes holding her in a trap.
Mirrie bit down on her lip and tried to gather her thoughts.
Nay, he is not mistaken.
She could kiss him again, feel his hands upon her. Mayhap more besides. The prospect was powerfully tempting, especially when his full lips twitched upwards into a smile as if he could read the thoughts running through her mind.
But where would that lead them? To Tristan, Mirrie would be no more than another of his conquests. He would enjoy her and then leave her behind without another thought while he moved on to win over the next maiden. Whilst her heart would shatter into shards and never again heal.
She grasped for the right words to remedy this spiralling situation. “We risk too much.”
“We do, for certain. You are right once again.” He nodded as if in serious agreement. “I would not do aught to risk ourfriendship, Mirrie.” He paused and sighed. “Though in truth, I cannot help but wonder if the risk might be worth the reward.”
“Tristan, stop it.” Her patience was at an end. “This is me you’re talking to.”
“I know right well who you are, Mirrie.”
“Do you?” She was cross now. “You don’t know that I once waited all day for you to return from Lindum. I had on my nicest dress and hardly dared to move from the front steps in case it crumpled. But you arrived with some sister of a friend on your arm, and you didn’t even notice me.”
She was as surprised as Tristan at the force of this memory, bursting up from where she had buried it many years ago.
Tristan’s eyes widened, but she wasn’t finished.
“You don’t know that every time you rode off to battle, I would spend hour after hour on my knees in the chapel, praying for your safe return.”
You don’t know that the main reason I accompanied Frida to Ember Hall was to get away from you. Because I realised long ago that you would never feel the same way about me. And it hurts. It hurts too much.
This last outburst went unspoken. She swallowed the words just in the nick of time, keeping them locked inside.
“You’re right, I never knew those things.” The glow of mischief left his eyes. “I feel I should apologise.”
She tossed her head. “There is naught to apologise for. I know right well whoyouare. I have always known.”
“And you have always held faith in me.” It was a statement.
She pressed her lips together. “Almost always.”
“Until now?” His tone was playful, but as soon as the words were spoken he held up his hands in apology. “Forgive me.”
Mirrie resisted the urge to stamp her foot in anger. “My faith in you is challenged for good reason. It seems you have taken leave of your senses.”
Tristan’s voice rose to match hers. “On the contrary. It seems to me that I have just now learned what my senses must have been telling me for years.”
I shouldn’t ask. I definitely shouldn’t ask.
“Which is what?” she demanded, knowing she played into his hands.
“That you are a beautiful woman, Mirrie.” He made no move to come nearer, and somehow his words were more intimate precisely because of the physical distance between the two of them.
But she would not let him be her undoing. She had been protecting herself from Tristan’s charms for years. One proper kiss could not break through her carefully constructed barriers.
