“She isn’t a liability,” I say finally. My voice is low, almost lost to the wind.
Thomas blinks, startled. “She’s standing in your way.”
“She’s standing for something.”
He doesn’t understand. He never will. He sees numbers, contracts, exit clauses. He doesn’t see the fire that burned in her eyes when she defied me at the council meeting, the way she braced her shoulders in the snow while I hung lanterns beside her, the quiet determination when she refused to let me have the couch. He doesn’t know the sound of her breath steadying as she slept inches from me, or the way her lips tasted of heat and defiance all tangled together. He doesn’t feel the weight of silence after.
Thomas clears his throat. “If you won’t let me file them, then tell me why. Give me something I can use. Because right now, Dralgor, you’re risking the reputation you’ve built over one woman.”
I stare across the square, watch Clara bend to help a child knot ribbons at the base of a pole. Her hair falls forward, and she brushes it back absently, still smiling at whatever the little boy says. She belongs here in a way I never will. The town has claimed her, and she has claimed it back, and for the very firsttime in longer than I can remember, I don’t know if I want to tear something down or keep it standing just to see her proud.
“Not yet,” I say at last. “Hold the papers.”
Thomas stiffens. “That’s not an answer.”
“It’s the only one you’ll get.”
His lips thin, but he doesn’t argue further. He knows when my word is final, even if he hates it.
Later, when the square is lit with lanterns and the vendors start pouring cider, I keep to the edges. People nod to me politely but don’t invite me in, and I don’t ask to be included. I watch instead. I watch Clara move from stall to stall, stubborn and glowing, hands always busy, voice always carrying. I watch her brush snow from her hair, laugh at Dee’s dramatic complaints, swat at Pippa’s enchanted mistletoe.
I watch her, and I wonder how long I can keep pretending the kiss meant nothing when everything in me knows it was the first true thing in years.
The cold presses closer, sharp against my skin, but the deeper freeze is inside me. Because I know what I should do. And I know what I want to do. Those two paths are no longer the same.
CHAPTER 13
CLARA
The sound is what wakes me. Not the whistle of wind through the gaps in the window frame or the distant thud of plows fighting their way down Main Street, but the hollow pop followed by a gurgling hiss.
At first, I think it’s another dream, maybe one of those nonsense ones where the house groans like it’s alive. But then water starts seeping across the kitchen floor, cold as the grave, spreading in a thin sheet that shines in the faint light from the lantern I forgot to put out.
I scramble out of bed, cursing under my breath as my feet hit the icy wood, and grab the heaviest towel I can find from the hall closet. By the time I reach the kitchen, the leak has turned into a steady spray, the pipe beneath the sink split open like it’s been waiting years for this exact moment to betray me. I shove the towel down, trying to slow the flood, but the water keeps coming, biting my hands until my fingers ache.
“Perfect,” I mutter, yanking the towel back up and wringing it out into the bucket by the stove. “Absolutely perfect timing. Because clearly I don’t have anything else on my plate this week.”
I grab the phone and call Mitch, the only plumber in town who hasn’t retired or moved south, but all I get is a groan followed by static. Then his voice, muffled and half-swallowed by bad reception: “Truck’s dead, Clara. Can’t get out there till morning. Maybe longer. Stay warm.”
Stay warm. As if warmth isn’t pouring across my floor right now, freezing into slick patches where the draft sneaks in.
I stare at the spreading water, hair falling into my face, my hands raw from wringing. And I hate what comes next. I hate it more than the leak, more than the storm, more than the way the whole damn lodge feels like it’s conspiring against me.
But I do it anyway.
I call Dralgor Veyr.
He shows up less than twenty minutes later, snow clinging to his shoulders, his size filling the doorway like the storm itself stepped inside. He doesn’t ask permission. He never does. He just ducks under the frame, sets down a tool bag that looks like it belongs in a war zone rather than a kitchen, and surveys the mess with eyes that miss nothing.
“You should have called me sooner,” he says, his voice low and steady.
“I should have called anyone but you,” I snap, shoving another towel against the spray. “Don’t flatter yourself.”
He crouches beside me, pries the towel from my grip, and jams a clamp over the pipe with hands so sure it makes me want to scream. “Mitch’s truck broke down. You didn’t have a choice.”
“There are always choices,” I bite back.
His mouth curves, but it’s not a smile. “Not always.”
