Although his question had been quiet, she snorted as she turned away from him, stalking toward the carefully arranged tools. “What does that have to do with anything?” Where the hell was it? “I’d choose to be an engraver.” Ah, there it is. She reached for the graver she’d tossed carelessly away, pulling it from the row. “I’m good at engraving.” The tool was perfectly weighted, fitting into her palm as if she’d been born with it there. “This—all of this—was my father’s. He taught me everything I ken about the art, because he wanted me to be the first female employed at Oliphant Engraving. I could’ve been too…”
Had she not accepted the chores Machara heaped upon her. Oh, her stepmother had been wily at it; she’d started small, using the chores as an excuse to help Ember forget her grief after her father had passed. Ember had been so young, and she’d believed everything her stepmother had told her.
By the time she’d realized what had happened, she was the one keeping the inn going, and she was too busy to follow her dreams the way she’d wanted.
Too busy, or too scared?
Behind her, Max cleared his throat. “When you first told me about this workshop, you said it belonged to the baroness’s second husband. You didn’t say it was your father’s.”
Forcing her fingers to unclench, Ember inhaled slowly. She reached up to place the graver in its rightful place. “Machara doesnae like me to mention my relationship to her with the guests. Just like she harangues me if I dinnae cover my hair.” Ember shrugged, still staring at the neat line of tools. “It’s easier to just do as she prefers.”
A pause. Then he asked quietly, “Wasn’t that a lie?”
She twisted to frown at him. “I didnae—” Had she lied? “I just… I just didnae say her husband was my father,” she began slowly.
“That’s true. And I didn’t lie—I just forgot to mention my last name. I’m sorry; meeting you felt personal enough that it didn’t even occur to me to give you a full introduction.” He straightened his shoulders, then dipped forward from the waist, as if in a formal setting. “Maxwell DeVille, at your service.”
She sniffed and tried to hold onto her resolve. “Ye already ken me. I’m just Ember.”
“Ember Oliphant, stepdaughter of a Baroness, attender of masked balls, engraver extraordinaire.”
When he said it like that, she sounded almost as fancy as him. “Ember Oliphant, serving lass.”
He grinned crookedly. “Max DeVille, cowboy.”
There was a feeling in her stomach, one she didn’t like. Hot and coiled, like anger, but…not.
Unable to look at him any longer, Ember turned away. The piece of turned metal was still clamped in the vice, but she couldn’t imagine working on it, not now, not with the way she was feeling at that moment.
Embarrassment. It’s embarrassment, ye ninny.
Heaven help her, it was.
He was right. She hadn’t mentioned her relationship with Baroness Oliphant, any more than he’d mentioned his last name. If he was at fault, so was she.
“Ember, I’m sorry I didn’t tell you my last name. When you mentioned my boss, I thought you meant Andrew Prince, who hired me back in Wyoming. Last night, I wasn’t quite sure why you thought he’d be interested in making shoes, but then I figured out who you were, and I was distracted by that and forgot to ask.”
“That’s alright,” she said dully. “I should’ve realized who ye were.”
“And how would you do that?” he scoffed. “You likely assumed I was there last night on business from my boss, who you thought was Mr. DeVille. Right?”
With a sigh, she nodded and finally risked a glance up at him. “Look, Mr. DeVille—”
“Max,” he corrected firmly. “After what we shared last night, no matter who we are or what jobs we do, I think you can call me Max, don’t you agree?”
Could she?
“Ember,” he prodded, “I’m Max.”
She sighed. Aye, he was Max, wasn’t he? The man she thought she’d been falling in love with. The man who made her happy and had her considering a future with.
The man whose tongue was on yer nipple.
Aye, that too.
“Alright, Max,” she said quietly.
She didn’t have to see his face to know he was smiling at her concession. But that realization only made the ache in her stomach intensify. She was still angry at him, but now it was tempered with shame, which made her angry at herself.
“I—”
She wasn’t sure what he’d been about to say. All she knew was that she couldn’t stand the embarrassment any longer. Even if she was the one who was embarrassing herself.
“Max,” she interrupted, turning her back to him and bracing her palms on either side of the vice. “I think it would be best if ye left.”
A pause, then his voice, sounding a bit strangled, asked, “Leave your workshop? Or leave the inn?”
She stared down at the wood between her hands and didn’t answer.
Behind her, he blew out a breath. “Well, alright then. Goodbye, Ember.”
And as his footsteps faded along the corridor, Ember allowed the tears—no longer angry tears, but ashamed ones—fall. She watched them soak into the wood of her father’s workbench and mourned what she’d been stupid enough to throw away.
Chapter 9
“Oh, this is just going brilliantly, is it no’? How is he supposed to woo her if he’s no’ even in the right place? Where’s the damn shoe?”
“Calm down, Broca. I’m certain everything will work out.”
“Are ye? Because ye dinnae sound certain. He’s left the inn, Evangeline! The shoe is in his office! Ember’s still at the inn, and—let me restate it, in case it’s no’ obvious—they’re no’ together!”
“That is correct, but Grisel has managed to infiltrate the story in a most ingenious way, and I have confidence in her ability to set it back on the right path.”
“Do ye? Have confidence in her, I mean. That’s nice that one of us does.”
* * *
His new house was very…nice.
Max stood in the center of the parlor, still holding his worn
