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“I want to learn how the humans make their burgers, but using your wood stove is infuriating,” he said, glaring at the overly crisp burgers on an ornate plate.
“What is your obsession with burgers? Have you had pizza? Or boneless wings? I feel like they deserve just as much love as this.” I sat down beside one of the stolen crates.
Arven cocked his head as he took a seat beside me. “I haven’t heard of these concoctions. Would you be willing to introduce me sometime?”
My heart skipped a beat. “As in, like, a date?”
His eyes were heated. The smile that spread over his lips was just as hot. I wanted to run my thumb over the corners of his mouth and see how taut they were. I refused to believe he smiled like that very often.
This was all for me.
“As in, like, a date.”
“Bastard,” I grumbled, looking away. “Don’t make me fall for you after all.”
He laughed. The sound echoed in the small living area despite how many pillows and blankets I’d brought in here. Somehow, the sound of Arven’s joy doubled. I couldn’t help but smile, too.
I knew that our fate threads were bound to one another. There was no questioning that. Hesitation had ahold of me, though. We would inevitably be pulled together, but I wanted to take it slow. I didn’t want to be forced into this just because the powers-that-be thought I’d make him stronger.
It wasn’t fair to be the fuel for a man’s growth.
Even if he took care of me.
I stared blankly at the wooden crate panels and thought about how different my life could be. I’d fought so hard to stay away from even my own domain, let alone the main elven realms. Now, I was here again and it felt right.
It felt like home because I wasn’t alone here anymore. There was sound as Arven played with the little wolpertinger. The smell of food filled the air and made it warmer somehow. I fell back into the pillows so I could stare at the ceiling.
“Do you want help opening the crates?” Arven asked. “Or would you like space while you go through them?”
“I haven’t even told you what’s in them.”
“I might be a monster, but I’m not daft,” he grumbled. “It doesn’t take much to put two and two together. Locke was the one to destroy your home, you had a strong reaction last time we entered his warehouse, and you made sure to leave with these crates in particular before setting his stock on fire. I believe it’s easy to assume that the contents belong to you and the home you lost.”
“Yeah,” was all I could muster.
“So, would you like company or privacy?” The wolpertinger chirped with him as he spoke.
“Company,” I said before I could even consider the options.
The domain would feel empty without him, though I wasn’t going to admit that out loud. Arven had woven himself into my life through sheer stubborn determination, and I admired that if only because it was the same kind of determination I had in me. He and I were the same in so many ways.
If no one else understood me, I knew he would.
“I stabbed a woman for you,” I said without thinking.
“It has taken every ounce of self-control to keep from hunting down Locke and doing the same for you. There are many scenarios in my mind that I would like to play out if only to get this hot rage on your behalf out of my system.”
I sucked my teeth. Arven hadn’t quite understood.
“That pretty Seelie Queen in Lakesedge? Cerridwen? She shouldn’t be alive. The Unseelie Queen that was there before her threatened to summon you if I didn’t bend to her will and kill Cerridwen before the Seelie girl could take the throne. I panicked. I didn’t want to see you ever again. Just the thought of being in the same room as you filled me with so much terror. I had no other choice.”
It seemed stupid in retrospect. Now that I knew Arven wasn’t to be feared—he’d had no part in my nightmares—I regretted what I’d done. Thankfully, Cerridwen was still alive, but that weight in my chest would have been so much heavier if she’d died.
“You didn’t know the truth,” Arven said softly.
His words freed me of so much guilt. He acknowledged that I’d had every right to fear him. Every choice I’d made under that assumption had been the right thing…well, for the most part. Stabbing Cerri hadn’t been the right thing to do, but Arven understood the will to survive.
He pulled me close so that my back pressed to his chest. With his chin on my crown and his arm laying lightly over my chest, I could feel the rumble of his voice when he spoke.
