Page 190 of A Vow of Embers

Anger? Yes. Always. He was an infuriating and contradictory man.

But hatred? That feeling had dissipated.

He wasn’t responsible for the tariff, and so he hadn’t caused Haemon’s death.

Quynh didn’t seem to think that Xander had kidnapped her as leverage. He and Thrax had kept her safe.

Locris still suffered because of what Ilion had done, but if I chose to believe Io and Xander, he would make that right and wasn’t responsible for it.

He hadn’t caused the dreams.

He had locked me in this room but I understood that he’d wanted to protect me after I was attacked. He went about it the wrong way, but he came to see his mistake, had apologized and undone it.

Xander had forced me into this marriage. But he had made concessions so that it wouldn’t be one-sided. He had kept up his end of our bargain even when I had forgotten the promises that I had made. And there had been a betrothal contract that I had tried to avoid. I’d had my reasons, but it was fair for him to call me an oath-breaker.

He had used Quynh to threaten me so that I would agree to marry him. I knew now that Thrax would never have let any harm come to her. It had been an empty threat.

And he’d done it for his people. I could certainly understand that.

He had lied to me from the beginning about his true identity.

But so had I.

I had behaved like an absolute hypocrite, being so angry with him over hiding who he was. And I didn’t like that I had done it. Why was I so upset with him for something I had also done?

My mind seized on the fact that he had kissed someone else while married to me. That I could still be mad about.

Although it didn’t seem to concern me too much every time I was busy shoving my tongue down his throat.

Letting out a sigh, I got up and went over to my mirror. I turned my back to it and tried to look over my shoulder to see the knots clearly.

It wasn’t working.

I faced the mirror again and took off the small crown, the bracelets. I had just reached up to take off my necklace when I heard the door open and close. Finally Io had figured out where I’d gone and had come to help me undress.

“Io, can you help me with this?”

But it wasn’t Io that I saw in the mirror.

It was Xander.

“People don’t usually mistake me for my sister,” he said. There was a gleam in his eye, a certain swagger in his movements that I didn’t recognize.

That wasn’t true. I did recognize it. I just hadn’t seen it in a while.

He stood right behind me, nearly touching. My entire body quivered with delight and tried to get closer to him. It was a struggle to hold still.

“What are you doing here?” It was a ridiculous question. This was his bedroom. But the way that he looked at me ... I was worried my dress was going to catch fire.

“It is my birthday and you have not yet given me my gift,” he said, his voice warm and seductive. “So I thought of something you could give me.”

“What?” I whispered.

“You could let me help you undress.”

Chapter Sixty-Two

Molten heat pounded low in my belly. Surely I had misheard.