Page 76 of Amber Gambler

“Frankie,” he gasped out. “I’m trying to…protect…you.”

“Tonight, she needed protectionfromyou.” Kierce stood over him. “Think about that.”

“She’s not yours.” He shoved into a seated position. “She will never be yours.”

“Don’t make this about me.” I held in stubborn tears. “This? Tonight? That was all you.”

Ready to go home, to shut the door on this night, I started walking back to the wagon.

“I can leave,” Kierce offered from behind me, his voice low, “if it will make things easier.”

Easier flew out the window about the time he tried to kiss me, and I realized how much I wanted him to.

After scraping my courage into a pile, I climbed to the top of it. “You’re not going anywhere.”

“Good.” His warm lips brushed my nape. “I’m glad.”

“Get in.” I couldn’t help my voice cracking as tingles shot down my spine. “It’s been a long day, and I’m starving.”

“Badb fed me sashimi for lunch,” he confessed as he rounded the wagon. “Ahi, uni, and tako.”

“Raw tuna, raw sea urchin, and…?”

“Raw octopus.”

“I’ve always feared I would be run out of town one day.” I fastened my seat belt as he got in next to me. “I figured it would be the talking-to-dead-people thing that got me in trouble. I had no idea a crow with a larcenous streak would be the real cause.”

“She bragged on you.” He rested his hand on the seat between us. “You took excellent care of her.”

“She took better care of herself.” I tapped the back of his hand. “You saw the cat bed, right?”

“And the toys.” He caught my finger and held it before releasing me. “And the bags of food.”

“You can hold my hand.” I slanted him a look. “If you want to, I mean.”

“I didn’t want to make you uncomfortable.”

“You’re not Harrow.” I shivered. “Though I hadn’t pegged him as the handsy type until tonight.”

“He’s made you a symbol.”

As much as I wished to deny it, I couldn’t shrug off my sour stomach. “Lyle died because he hated me.”

“Lyle made you a symbol too.” Kierce slid his fingers between mine. “You became the cause of every bad thing in his nephew’s life. Perhaps in his too. He hated the otherness in you, and in Harrow. It must have gnawed on his conscience, knowing he couldn’t love his own flesh and blood the way he wanted to.”

“Does that mean Harrow wants to love me but can’t help hating me a little for what I am?”

“He hates himself more.” He watched the scenery roll past. “Perhaps he hasn’t realized it yet, but in trying so hard to love you, the person he wants most to accept is himself.”

“They say with age comes wisdom, but that was deep.”

“I prefer observing people to interacting with them. Distance provides clarity.”

“Distance also isolates. To always hold yourself apart sounds lonely.”

“Most people move in set patterns.” He gazed out his window. “Learn to predict them and?—”

“—you can’t get hurt?” A flash caught my eye, and I slammed on the brakes. “Good God in Heaven.”

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