The horses clomped over the dirt road as I tried to steady myself. My tight chest only let through short, shallow breaths. It was a long moment before Theodore finally looked at me. I kept my eyes on the road ahead.
“My turn,” I said, when I was finally able to speak. “You’re a pompous ass. You’re so self-righteous that it’s made you callous and closed off. You lack empathy. For me. For anyone who wasn’t given choice and power and gold from their cradle, like you were. Your ridiculous sense of duty does not make you better than me. It makes you see in simple shapes, in black and white, and so it’s made you see only pieces of me. And I hate that even though you are sanctimonious, and stubborn, and have treated me unkindly,I desperately want you to see me as I truly am. To see that just because my courage does not look like yours, or Ligea’s, does not mean I lack it. You wish to control me, and you’re hardly better than Nemea for it.” My voice became wobbly, and I spoke in a rush. “I’ve heard you laugh once, and it was to scoff at me. I’ve only seen you smile genuinely at your dressmaker. For fuck’s sake, you think that simply thinking me beautiful might besmirch your hallowed name. And Gods forbid the paeans that will no doubt be written about you might mention you being virile. No, the great God-king Theodore was unplagued by evil desire. He made beautiful women wear sacks—”
“All right.” Theodore’s voice was desolate.
“No, I’m not done. You could use a Godsdamned fuck. A good, long one. Hopefully your new wife will enjoy your chaste kisses and rigid embraces and the fireworks you shoot off for her in the bay, because that’s the most warmth she’ll get.”
My anger was vivid and beating and I wanted him to know it, but I’d spewed a half truth. I’d felt his warmth before, many times. Even now, the memory of his strong hand against the plane of my stomach filled me with a heavy, fiery ache.
Sullen, Theodore moved back into the lead. We rode through vineyard after vineyard without speaking a word. The sun curved in its wide arc over the sky, and as it fell back toward the horizon, Theodore pulled us off to the side of the road.
Jaw tight, he dismounted and rummaged through the saddlebag. He pulled out a bottle of wine. Wrestled the cork free. “Did that make you feel better?” He took a long swig.
“No.” I threw my leg over my horse and winced as I fell to my feet. I groaned and met his glare. “I feel worse. You were right, it was an awful idea.”
He huffed an agreement. Took another deep drink. He came closer, too close, and I stiffened. “Here.” He stared down at me with heated, narrowed eyes as he waited for me to take the wine.
I took a long drink, my gaze stuck to his as I did. It was the same wine I’d drunk at the table in the Garden Room. Sparkling and sweet. I took another drink. “It’s good.”
“Thank you.”
“Did you make it?”
He nodded. “The grapes came from two vineyards back. I tend to them.”
I smirked. “You garden?”
“I do.” He gave me a smile, though hurt still swam in his gaze. “Maybe they’ll add that to those paeans they’ll write about me,” he said in a glum tease. “King Theodore, the gardening prude.”
I returned a smile. “Lachlan told me you weren’t always.” His dark brow quirked. “He told me about your nights on your ship filled with women.”
Theodore gave a deep laugh. It was husky and dark and I stilled at the sound of it. “I thought he might have. Fucking Lachlan.” His cheeks were full of color, and an errant smirk curled his lips. He checked the deepening sky, the small clouds starting to grow over it like scales. “About a mile up there’s a caretaker’s cottage. They’re open for travelers and land workers.” His gaze locked with mine. “We can sleep there tonight.”
I nodded and a peal of anticipation rang through me. When I tried to lift my aching leg into the stirrup, it slipped, and I nearly stumbled. A pained groan filled my chest, but Theodore was at my back, hands encircling my waist. He tightened his grip like he was readying to lift me, but he leaned in instead. His hand traveled up so his knuckles just grazed the underside of my breast.
His lips were at my ear. “If I had known you then…”
Heart on a rampage, I looked up into his eyes. “Yes?”
I couldn’t breathe. He furrowed his brow, pressed his mouth shut, like he’d thought better than to speak the words that sat on his tongue.
“Tell me.”
Slowly, he spread his fingers wide and dug into my ribs, as if he wanted to touch as much of me as possible. “I would have worshipped you,” he said, husky and slow. “Laid you out over my bed like a goddess on her altar and gotten on my knees before you. And when we were done, after a very long time…” He brought me tighter to his chest, and I all but melted into him. My nose brushed his chin. “… I’d thank you for tearing me to ribbons with those pretty talons of yours.”
Abruptly, he pulled away. He lifted me up into the saddle so quickly that my head spun. A protesting, throaty moan slipped past my lips, forcing an embarrassed flush to my cheeks. He looked up at me with a cocky smile.
“You’re an ass.”
“Yes, I know,” he said through a chuckle. He mounted and clicked his tongue and both horses started down the road. For the first time, his body had relaxed, strong shoulders sloping with an easiness I’d never seen him wear.
“You’re looking very self-satisfied,” I snipped.
“Easy to do when you get a woman to make that sound.”
Theodore kept the horses at a slow walk, and thank the Gods, because every muscle in my body hurt. As did my ego. But the air between us was clearer, less charged.
“I wouldn’t have torn you to ribbons,” I finally said, coyly. “I’m not that wasteful.”
