Total pages in book: 32
Estimated words: 32532 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 163(@200wpm)___ 130(@250wpm)___ 108(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 32532 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 163(@200wpm)___ 130(@250wpm)___ 108(@300wpm)
And I...
I understand him perfectly since I’ve been secretly studying that language for years, in hopes that my dream vacation to Paris would one day come true.
“Oui, elle est en sécurité.” Yes, she’s safe.
A pause. He’s listening to whoever’s on the other end.
“C’est tout ce que tu as à dire?” Is that all you have to say?
Another pause.
“J’ai, oui.” I have, yes.
His voice drops lower, but I catch every syllable.
“Je compte la marier.” I plan to marry her off.
My heart, which had just started to feel safe, cracks right down the middle.
He wants to...
Me...
He wants to marry me off?
Chapter Five
ZACHARIE HAD NOT SLEPT.
This was not unusual. Sleep had always been a negotiation rather than a surrender, his body too well-trained to let its guard down completely. But tonight, last night, the sleeplessness had taken on a different quality. Less vigilance, more...something else.
Something he refused to name.
He stood outside her door at six in the morning, a medical kit in one hand and a tray of breakfast in the other. The staff had offered to handle both tasks. He had dismissed them with a look that brooked no argument.
It was practical. He needed to assess her condition himself. Gauge her mental state. Determine the next steps.
That was all.
He knocked once. Waited. Knocked again.
“Come in.”
Her voice was different. Softer than yesterday, but not in the warm way. Muted. Like someone had turned down her volume overnight.
Yesterday, she had been all nervous chatter and wide eyes and that ridiculous moment where she had almost called him mine. He had caught the shape of the word on her lips before she swallowed it down, and the memory had lodged somewhere inconvenient in his chest.
He pushed open the door.
She was sitting up in bed, the silk sheets pooled around her waist. The morning light caught her hair, turning the dark strands almost auburn. Her oversized cardigan, the cream one, now ruined beyond salvation, had been replaced by one of his guest robes. It swallowed her whole, making her look smaller and even more fragile than she already was.
Zacharie noticed the way she avoided his gaze as he approached her.
“Good morning,” he said.
“Morning,”
Her voice was a mumble. And her face was...wan. No smiles, no-near blushes. Nothing that indicated she was still the same girl he had rescued.
Something had changed overnight, and Zacharie did not know what.
“I need to change your bandages.”
She nodded without looking up and shifted, turning slightly to give him access to her wounded side. The movement was cooperative but distant, like she was performing a task rather than allowing an intimacy.
Zacharie set the tray on the bedside table and lowered himself onto the edge of the mattress. The bed dipped under his weight, and she tensed almost imperceptibly before forcing herself to relax.
Not good.
His awareness of hers...
It made him notice everything about her.
And it had to stop.
“This may sting,” he said, reaching for the edge of her robe.
“O-Okay.”
At last, a crack in her wall, but the fact that she was walling him off in the first place did not sit well with him. Then again...that anything about her bothered him was also unfortunate, and it was this that had his lips tightening even as he proceeded with his duty.
Zacharie carefully peeled back the fabric as he slowly exposed the bandaged wound beneath. The gauze was spotted with dried blood but not soaked through. It was a good sign, indicating healing.
His fingers brushed her skin as he worked, but his movements stilled the moment he noticed her flinching, a tiny, involuntary shiver that ran through her whole body, her breath catching audibly in the quiet room.
“Did I hurt you?”
She shook her head, her gaze still avoiding his. “It’s f-fine.”
And so he continued to peel away the old bandage.
Ah.
The wound beneath was angry but clean, the stitches holding. His medical training took over, antiseptic, fresh gauze, tape, but some other part of him remained hyperaware of everything else that made Mira...her.
Even though this was all about his duty, he could not deny how delicate and warm the curve of her waist was beneath his palm. Or how the uneven rhythm of her breathing had an effect on his own breathing, and how goosebumps rose on her skin wherever his fingers grazed, trailing in the wake of his touch like he was leaving marks on her.
As he pressed the new bandage into place, he noticed the way her hands fisted in the silk sheets, noticed the way her heartbeat fluttered against his hand.
She still wasn’t looking at him. Had not looked at him once since he sat down. Her gaze fixed on her own hands, twisted in the sheets, her jaw tight, a flush spreading down her neck and disappearing beneath the collar of her robe.
Yesterday, she had stared at him constantly. Had blushed and stammered and looked at him like he was something between a predator and a puzzle she desperately wanted to solve.