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I grabbed for the mallet but she was quicker than I was now that the danger had passed and my blood wasn’t up. I’d been riding hard for days; I was mentally and physically exhausted. For once, she might just have the jump on me. What a fucking time to lose my goddamned advantage.
“I had to go,” I said, stepping slowly toward her, keeping my movements calm and collected so I didn’t spook her more than she already was.
She backed away from me. And then, once she’d put more than an arm’s length between us, she looked me in the eye. “So do I.”
And with that, she fucking bolted for the door.
As she ran, she thrust the big pine table toward me to block my escape. I planted my hand on the edge and jumped over it, huffing with the effort, but she was already ahead of me. I chased her out into the kitchen gardens, following the sound of her sprinting footsteps to the iron gate that led out into the open fields.
The hinges creaked and she slammed it back behind her to try to block my exit, but I met the iron with my shoulder, grunting as I followed close behind her. For one second, she hesitated, deciding which way to go. That was all the luck I needed. I scooped her up in both arms.
But she was in the mood for a fight, and she gave me a hell of a run for my money. Kicking, biting, elbowing me hard in the gut and chest. I narrowly dodged one of her head butts. All the time, I held her as an embrace rather than a restraint, doing my best to meet her fury with love. It wasn’t in my nature to act that way, not usually, but with her it was fucking different. Always.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” I told her as she writhed against my body. “I’ll never fucking hurt you.”
Her physical fury lessened, giving way to a painful, heaving sob. She went limp in my arms as she sobbed even harder, fucking awful body-shaking gasps that broke my goddamned heart.
“But you did! You did. You left. You abandoned me. Right when I needed you most.”
“Wait, wait, wait,” I said, turning her around in my arms, still holding her close. She didn’t resist my embrace this way, thank god. The pain over her pushing me away from her then would’ve broken me in two. But still she cried and her body heaved with painful sobs. “Talk to me. Tell me what happened.”
“You happened,” she said, her voice cracking with emotion. “You hung those sheets. I became the laughing stock of the kingdom. And you weren’t even there to help me.”
With the words, she melted into a whole new wave of grief. Shame. Indignity.
This fucking world. Nothing was sacred, nothing was left to be cherished. What I had done, I had done in love and devotion. But as per goddamned usual, everything good can be weaponized. Just like her virginity had been, it seemed.
“That was not what I wanted,” I told her, drawing my face back slightly from hers, trying to get a look into her eyes. Her hair was damp with tears, and it took me a few tries to get a lock off of her cheek. “I left you a note, my love! ”
“There was no note! Falroy!”
The fox appeared from nowhere, chattering at my ankles but right now at least, not attempting to bite.
She’d backed me into a corner and now I had so much to explain that I didn’t even know where to begin. My mind was upside down with delirious exhaustion. I wasn’t even sure I could string together a sentence, and here she was asking me to explain everything.
“Listen,” I said, pressing my forehead against hers. “I promise that none of this.” I held her close and repeated, “None of this is as it seems. But I will explain everything to you. Alright? I just need some time to clear my mind. To rest. I had to go for us, I had to set things in motion and undo some old wrongs.”
She wasn’t hearing me. “That quote-unquote wedding we had wasn’t even legal, Maksim. So, I’m not yours, and you’re not mine. I don’t want to see your face ever again. I want to forget all of this ever happened. You left no note. Don’t try to pretend you did the right thing somehow. You’re just playing with me and I’m done with the game.”
My exhaustion cleared like a fucking lightning bolt. “Don’t you ever say that again,” I said, walking her backward up against the garden wall. “And I did leave a note. I will never lie to you. I left it on the table by the water pitcher, knowing you or Maria would see it there when you woke.”
