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“Because we’ve caught so many fish so far?” I gestured to our empty lines.

Mira snickered. “Then we’ll take bites from each other, I suppose.”

Before she could return to her place, I yanked her body to mine, chest to chest. “Careful what promises you make.”

Mira’s eyes heated. “Keep looking at me like that, and I might toss the food overboard now.”

“Woman.” I shook my head and kissed the tip of her nose. “Does nothing intimidate you?”

“Oh, yes, Hearttalker.” She held my gaze for a moment. “Some recent emotions have become wildly intimidating. I hardly know what to do with them.”

Mira did not give me time to press before she returned to the rail of the boat, dropped her feet in the water, and hummed one of her favorite sea shanties.

“I have turned a strange shade of red.” Mira inspected her arm where the skin had turned a rosy hue.

Doubtless her skin was unaccustomed to all the direct sunlight. Earth fae realms were often cast in mists and darker clouds. Their forests were thick and ominous. The glamour fae kingdom had more in common with the Ever Sea, with its heavier air and lush ponds and swamps, but nothing like open waters.

I grinned. “Sewell would say the ‘gleam has kissed you,’ meaning the sun is eating your flesh alive.”

Mira blew out a breath. “I prefer Sewell’s description.”

I stripped my tunic and handed it over. “Put this over your head for a time. It’ll shade you.”

“If you wanted to get naked, Hearttalker, all you had to do was say so.” Mira winked but complied and draped my top over her shoulders. “What about your skin?”

“I don’t scorch the same way you do unless I’m in earth fae realms. Then I dry out like a dead fish.”

Mira laughed. “Is it truly that awful for you?”

“No. Not as long as I can visit water daily.”

“Good.” She leaned back onto her palms. “I would not know what to do if you despised my kingdom. I imagine we’ll be there more often, after all.”

Pressure gathered in my chest. We’d not discussed anything about what came next. Two different worlds, two different positions in our individual kingdoms. Livia took the crown in the Ever, but her folk had other heirs through her brother or her cousins.

Mira was the lone heir of her kingdom. I had lived my life devoted to protecting and serving the Ever King.

I picked at a callus on my palm. “You truly think so?”

A groove dug between her brows. “Don’t you? I thought…well, I just thought so much has changed.”

Mira wrung her fingers in the fabric of her skirt, a sign I’d come to learn meant her thoughts were spinning, and soon her mouth would follow.

“Then again, we’ve never really spoken of what comes next,” she blurted out. “Perhaps you did not think anything would continue after the isle, which you are, of course, entitled to think. I would simply like to know. I had hoped we might continue exploring”—she waved her hand between us—“whatever might be happening here.

“Naturally there are challenges. I have duties to my kingdom, as do you, but I imagined there would be some understanding since Livia is nothing less than a sister and Erik is your blood. Frankly, if they do not understand, they are the truest of hypocrites. Honestly, a Night Folk fae is your queen, and Erik stole her, Hearttalker. Stole her, yet they have made it work—”

I kissed her, half for the pleasure of it and half to slow her words. Mira sighed against me, her hands gripping my shoulders.

When I pulled back, I used my thumb to tug at her bottom lip. “I had no plans to stop wanting you once we returned home. I was questioning whether my presence would be accepted by your folk.”

“Ah.” Mira’s cheeks flushed a pretty pink. “Apologies. My mind ran away from me again.”

I kissed the curve of her throat. “I don’t mind, Vicious. It makes me feel better knowing you lose your wits as much as me.”

She used her elbow to nudge my ribs. “I do not ‘lose my wits.’ ”

“But now that we are returning to our regular lives, you are waiting for me to conclude that our time on the isle was what? A way to pass the time?”