“I want to.”
She looked up at him. His eyes were tired, sad, but fire burned in them too. She didn’t know what kind of fire, or what it meant, or why it flamed.
She only knew it consumed her. Like a moth, she wanted to be closer, even conscious she would be scorched. “Felton…why did you not tell me?”
“About Hugh?”
She nodded.
“Because there was no reason. You had pain enough.”
“You comforted mine. I should have comforted yours.”
He looked away, smiled, and shook his head, but when his eyes sought hers again, moisture was in his gaze. “You have a trueness in you, Eliza Gillingham, I have never seen in anyone in my life.”
The praise brought her closer. Nearer to the flame.
“You make me want to tell you things.”
“What things?”
“I was nine when they first accused Papa. The constable and several men from the village came that night, with lanterns and torches, and shouted things about the gallows.”
“But they set him free.”
“Yes, they set him free. One week later, the same men came back. They threw stones through the windows and eggs at the walls and screamed that no woman killer should live free.” The knot in his throat bobbed. “We could not go anywhere. The ladies shunned my mother. The men cursed at us. So many times, the village urchins pounced on Aaron and Hugh and me…beat us so bad we learned how to beat them back.”
“I am sorry, Felton. So very sorry.”
“I couldn’t run away like Aaron. I couldn’t run away like Hugh. I had to stay here. I had to make things right. I had to find the man who did this to us so the Northwood name could be clean.”
“You will find him.”
“He didn’t just kill your mother. He killed Hugh…he killed so much he …” He shook his head, glanced up at the ceiling. “I do not know. Sometimes I wish I could just forget all of it. I wish I could pretend, like Papa, that it did not exist.”
“Pretending does not make things different.”
“No.”
“Someday you shall be happy, Felton. This will be over. Then you can run away or stay here forever or do anything in the world you wish.”
“And you?” He drew closer. He pried her hands from their death clasp on the glass and tangled her fingers with his. “What do you wish of everything in the world?”
“To be free of the nightmares.”
He drew closer.
To be the mermaid in the sea.
Closer, nose brushing hers.
To kiss the man in the rowboat.
His mouth fell next to her lips. He lingered there, breathing against her, and one of his hands seeped into her hair. He waited, waited, waited.
Her heart faltered with the same thrill of dipping in and out of the ocean, and breaking the surface, and leaping with a salty splash into his kiss.
His hands seized her face. He pressed hard, quick, roving her lips, drinking her love. Yes, she was burning, just as the moth. She’d known it would burn. He was out of control, and she was out of her mind, and the flames choked her and thrilled her and engulfed her.
