He moved with caution, his body slow, deliberate, as though giving her time to back away. Yet she didn’t. She couldn’t. Her feet were rooted to the floor as the warmth of his body drew near.
Heat washed over her in waves, crashing against her resolve. His proximity made her dizzy.
He leaned in, towering over her now, his lips brushing her ear.
“None,” he answered. “Either ye believe me or ye dinnae. I cannae change yer mind, just like I doubt ye’ll change mine.”
Lavina’s eyes widened.
Theo pulled back then, reaching for a pillow. What had she expected him to do? Kiss her?
At that moment, she was no longer in the keep, but back at the altar. A bride standing before God and country. Hiskiss had stirred something within her then, something deep and unknown—a blanket of comfort and security that wrapped around her heart like a balm.
She blinked, and the vision was gone.
Theo sat down near the fire. He tossed the pillow to the floor and plopped onto it, his back turned to her.
The distance stung. It felt as though there was a thicker wall between them now than the very balcony that had once shielded them from the storm.
Slowly, Lavina crawled beneath the blanket and the scratchy muslin sheets. Every nerve in her body tingled as she tried—and failed—to get comfortable.
How she wished the storm would pass, if only to offer even a moment’s reprieve from the torment in her chest.
But as another bolt of lightning flashed beyond the window, she knew there was no end to the torrential rain. At least not tonight.
“Do ye ken how to measure the storm?” Theo’s voice came low and soothing, tickling her ears from across the room.
“Ye can do that?” she asked, surprised, glancing toward where his frame lay near the hearth.
He had tilted his head just enough to lend her an ear.
“Ye watch the lightning and count until ye hear the thunder,” he explained. “The number ye reach tells ye how far the storm is. Each count is about a mile. If ye listen closely, ye can hear it rollin’ away.”
Lavina clutched the blanket tighter as another bolt of lightning lit the chamber.
“Now, start countin’,” Theo coaxed.
Lavina counted silently in her head. By the time she reached five, thunder rumbled outside.
“I counted five,” she whispered.
“As did I,” Theo said, his voice calm and steady.
Lavina relaxed into her pillow, a strange comfort wrapping around her.
“There’s yer answer,” Theo murmured, just as another flash split the sky. They waited?—
“Ten,” she gasped, surprised.
“Ye see? It’s movin’ away,” he said, shifting to get more comfortable by the fire. “Now, maybe I’ll be able to get some sleep.”
His words pulled a sliver of ire from Lavina as if they were poison working their way to the surface.
She narrowed her eyes at the darkness and snuggled deeper beneath the covers, though unease niggled at her still. Even with the storm moving away, she was sharing the night with a man she believed to be a cold-blooded killer.
There was no way she’d find sleep. If it wasn’t the distant thunder keeping her awake, it was Theo’s snores.
She didn’t know when exactly she had fallen asleep. All she knew was that the bed was just as cold as it had been when she slipped into it. Panic shot through her as she remembered where she was.
