Page 133 of Rogue Elves of Ardani

“It’s fine. Don’t trouble yourself.”

“I saw him hit you. It’s not fine.”

“I’ve had far worse. Anyway, I saw him get you, too.”

“That doesn’t make it fine.”

She gave a dry smile—one of the smiles that didn’t look like she meant it, she supposed. “I’ve never known you to fuss over anyone. Who knew you could be such a gentleman?”

“Does that surprise you?”

She supposed she had no idea what he was like normally, with people he cared about. She’d only really experienced his scorn and his indifference. Maybe he really was a gentleman sometimes, with other women.

“You’ve experienced much worse assaults than this,” she said. “You should know which injuries are worth worrying about, and which ones aren’t. Do you think I can’t take it?”

He tilted his head at her disapprovingly. “Are you so unaccustomed to someone being concerned for your health?”

She laughed hollowly. “Yes, I guess I am.”

There was a heavy pause. Then he knelt down at her feet and began unlacing her other boot for her.

“I’m not drunk this time. I can manage it myself,” she said.

“So can I.”

She watched him deftly unlace her boot and then put them both neatly to the side of the bed. He slowly looked up at her. Crow felt her heartbeat quicken. The sight of him on his knees before her was too much.

“What are you doing, Vaara?” she said tiredly. “What is this?”

“What?”

“You keep making me want to touch you, and I know if I try, you’ll pull away again. This much rejection isn’t good for my ego.”

He paused, holding her gaze. “I won’t pull away this time.”

She tilted her head, surprised. “Is that so?” she asked softly. She reached down to hold his wrist, not touching skin. He didn’t react. She decided to push her luck. “What if I wanted to kiss you?”

“You may,” he said quietly.

She hesitated, skeptical, then leaned closer. “Are you sure?”

“No.”

She arched an eyebrow, trying not to look dejected. But he brought a hand to her face, brushing a thumb over the growing bruise, then leaned in and touched his lips to hers.

She felt a thread of his anticipation and nerves and then a spike of heat. There was something else there that hadn’t been there before. A warm feeling that was purely positive. A rare, uncompromised gladness.

Perhaps out of petty spite more than anything, she manifested a vision of him rejecting her on the street in front of Akaia’s Haven. She felt a brief splintering of regret in him.

He pulled away, only to weave a hand through her hair and bury his face in her neck. She sucked in a breath as his lips grazed and marked her.

There are things I wasn’t ready for you to see,he thought. The words were accompanied by anticipation and fear.

She frowned.Things?

Don’t you understand yet?

What things?she pressed.

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