The Treasure Keeper

He had stilled, that ungainly weight, that sharp sandalwood scent. He lay propped above her, saying nothing, his heart drumming directly over hers.

'No,' she breathed, incredulous. She pushed at him, hard.

'No,' she said again through her teeth as he rolled off her, right back to the edge of the mattress, where he sat, silent and inert, a block of wood.

'Is it you?' She scrambled free of the covers, shoved a hand against his shoulder; he accepted the force of it, didn't move otherwise. 'Is it?'

Without warning, Hayden slumped forward, his hair dangling to his face. His torso lifted into a long, hoarse shudder; when he straightened again, he stared bemused about the chamber. He didn't even see her there, on her knees right there beside him.

'Hayden,' she said, composed.

He looked back at her.

'Are you here now?' she asked.

'Zoe.' He gave a little shake of his head. 'Why are you in my room?

'I'm afraid you're in mine.'

He came instantly to his feet. He smoothed a hand down his chest—he wore a nightshirt, his legs bare, and she knew now there were no drawers beneath it—and backed away from her.

'Don't be alarmed.' She spoke soothingly. 'You were sleepwalking, I think.'

'I was? I say, that's . I've never .'

She scooted to the end of the bed, making certain her shins were covered. 'How do you feel? Are you well?'

'I don't remember any of it. My dear! I beg your pardon. I fear I must have been far more weary than I even realized. Was I . did I do anything to—er, to offend you?'

'Not in the least. I awoke when you touched my wrist. That was all.'

He pressed back against the door. He regarded her without moving, a golden-haired stranger who had embraced her with such passion only minutes before. There might have been a darker shadow beside him, to the left; a trick of the night or something more devious.

The annoyance from before spiraled deeper, twisting more into anger and a curl of unexpected grief, so she added, 'But you may stay if you like, Hayden.'

'Dearest girl.' He reached for the knob behind him, caught himself short and sketched a curt bow. 'I apologize most sincerely for all this. It won't happen again.'

He was a spot of brighter gloom in his voluminous shirt, there and gone with the closing of her door. Zoe fixed her gaze to where that deeper darkness had been, now vanished as Hayden was.

'No,' she agreed, clenching her fists. 'It surely won't.'

She waited sitting up in her bed, unable to sleep now in any case, an oil lamp burning a small yellow flame upon the bureau in the corner. Outside roosters were beginning to crow; she'd opened the curtains and the shutters, and the skyline of Paris was burning pink and orange. Cathedral bells clanged and clanged, challenging the roosters.

'Rhys.' She shaped his name with hardly any sound. She thought it, she felt it, and cast the cloak for him, dragging back a wake of blue nothing.

'Rhys. Come to me.'

There were clouds in the heavens. They were green on top, green with fire-painted edges. 'Rhys Sean Valentin Langford.'

She felt him before she saw him. Felt the air change, felt her body change, tiny hairs standing on end, an acknowledgment of his winter presence.

He was by the window. The colors of the dawn misted through him, mother-of-pearl through his outline of smoke.

'That was unkind,' she said, just as quiet as before.

He looked away from her as if bored, toward the daisies on the wall. His arms were folded across his chest. Linen shirt, silver waistcoat. Those leaves of embroidered holly.

Just like Hayden's riding coat, she'd stitched that waistcoat herself. She remembered it well; his sister Lia had commissioned it one Christmas, years past, and Zoe had chosen for it the deep green thread she thought would best go with his eyes.

'Promise me you'll never attempt it again.'

He shook his head.

'Promise.'

'No. I won't promise.' He spoke forcefully. Unlike her, he was free to be as loud as he pleased.

'Why should I?'

Her temper began to unravel. 'Because it's wrong. It's wrong to—to toy with me that way. To meddle with my affections. With him, as if he's nothing more than a puppet!'

'I'm not toying. I'm dead serious.'

She paused. 'Was that supposed to be humorous?'

'If you like.' He sounded surly.

'Well, I don't.'Her fingers curled against the sheets. 'I don't like any of this. I've told you that you need to leave, and you respond like this, like it's all a game to you, like nothing in this world matters to you but what you want, and what you desire.' She tossed back the covers and climbed free of the bed, her nightgown a ruffled restraint at her ankles.

He watched her come close. He watched her with eyes that now better matched the ethereal clouds. 'Was it so unpleasant?' He was a lord, or had been, and he looked it still: regal and proud and handsome enough to steal the very light from the sky. 'Tell me, Zee. Was it?'

She lifted her hands, frustrated. 'It was a lie. So yes, it was unpleasant.'

He dropped his gaze. 'Not for me.'

'You must never do it again, Rhys. I mean that with all my heart. Never again.'

He tipped his head without raising his gaze from her feet. His lips made a mirthless smile. 'We'll see.'

And he disappeared before she could speak another word. The view beyond the window blazed clear again.

* _{* *}

Against his will, by the haunting of his shadow music, he began to dream it: a life with her. Darkfrith, with her. Children, with her. By their living laws she was already his, and Rhys found it easier and easier to slip into the reverie of that notion.

Sitting with her upon the banks of the lake. Walking through the woods with her, the snow. Leaping to the stars with Zoe Langford laughing on his back.

Sleeping with her. Wrapped in long ivory hair every night, skin to skin, heat and pleasure. The taste of her lips.

Zee.

All his. At last.

Chapter Seventeen

 Breakfast was a quiet affair. By the listless light of the kitchen hearth, she'd slapped together a meal from the sole items left in the larder: poached eggs and olive oil, a crumbly white goat cheese, and sausage links fried in cast iron. Coffee and milk and the last lemony wedge of the tarte au citron from that bakery down the street, almost half of which she devoured herself while cooking the eggs.

So the eggs were overdone. She'd disguised it by adding more oil to them than they required, but the results were adequate.

If Hayden and the Zaharen wanted an actual chef, they should have hired one.