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“That’s not what I said.”

“You didn’t have to.” Her voice stays low because, even angry and humiliated, she remembers where we are. She fixes the neckline of her dress and looks once more toward the door. “He won’t say anything?”

“No.”

“Because he’s discreet.”

“Yes.”

She gives a small laugh, without humor. “Right.”

“Elara, wait.”

But she’s already moving. She unlocks the library door herself, opens it just enough to check the hall, then slips out before I can stop her without making it worse.

The door closes softly behind her.

I stand there for a moment, listening to her footsteps fade, and I get this feeling that I’m fucking up things again.

22

ELARA

I leave the library before Nikolai can say anything else.

Kirill is standing near the end of the hall.

He lowers his eyes the second he sees me, but that somehow makes it worse. I don’t want his politeness. I don’t want his discretion. I don’t want to be another private thing in this house that everybody knows about and nobody mentions.

I walk past him without looking at his face.

My cheeks are still hot. My dress feels wrong on my body, like everyone can tell exactly what happened under it. I know that’s irrational. Kirill is the only one who saw us, and he barely saw anything before Nikolai moved in front of me, but that doesn’t matter.

I turn the corner and almost collide with Galina carrying a folded blanket.

“Miss Elara,” she says, stepping aside.

“Sorry.”

“No harm done.” Her eyes move over my face for half a second. I hate that too.

By the time I reach my room, my hands are shaking.

I close the door and lean back against it, breathing hard, furious with myself for feeling like this and furious with Nikolai for making it worse.

He can be discreet. As if that was the problem.

As if my concern was whether Kirill would gossip over tea.

Has this happened before? He didn’t answer. Not like this.

I laugh once, quietly, because if I don’t laugh, I might cry.

Not like this. Wonderful. Excellent. Apparently, I’m special enough to be different, but not special enough to avoid being compared.

I sit on the edge of the new bed. The new bed. God.

A month ago, I arrived in this house with one half-broken life, and no plan beyond earning enough money to leave safely. I told myself this was temporary. A job. A roof. A way to breathe until I found my next step.