Page 99 of The Moorwitch

“You come in here like a summer storm,” he says softly, “and you change everything. Why? What drives you?”

“I can only be what I am.”

“And what are you?”

Traitor. Spy. Puppet.The acidic truth tingles on my tongue.

Conrad is but a touch away. A tilt of the head. A lean. A raised hand. He could be mine. I feel it in this moment, as surely as I have ever felt anything. But if I close that distance between us, giving us what I can no longer deny we both want ... and then, when he finds out all the secrets I’ve been keeping and sees me for what I truly am ...

His hand drops from my hair, instead trailing up my sleeve, then, hesitantly, his fingertips brush the bare skin of my shoulder. A shiver of heat runs down my back, and I gasp a little. That small touch threatens to set fire to every ounce of resistance in my body.

So what if I have secrets?a traitorous whisper asks from the back of my mind.So what if he learns them? Let the future sort itself. Live for this moment.

He waits, as if wondering how I will react. If I will pull away or tell him to stop.

I don’t.

Instead, I tilt my head, my cheek brushing the back of his hand. My eyes never waver from his. I wait for him to make the decision I am too terrified to make, knowing if he does, I will be helpless to resist.

“Rose,” he breathes warningly, as if he weren’t the one who started this.

He was the one who kissedme, down in the realm of faeries.

Thinking of that night brings a flush of heat to my middle, and my gaze lowers to his mouth. My reason unravels more quickly than I can gather it up. My guilt gives way to longing. The need to touch him pulses through my body, a physical, primal ache so strong it makes my chest hurt in a way no spell ever has.

“Well?” I whisper. “What is it you want, Conrad?”

He doesn’t have to speak. His hungry eyes say everything. He leans forward and brushes his lips against my throat, and my breath, my heart, my very thoughts all stop—

“By the Fates!” squeals a voice.

We rip apart. I hadn’t realized how close we’d been until Mrs. MacDougal bursts from the kitchen, a lantern swinging in her hand.

“Look at you! Come inside at once! You’ll catch your deaths of pneumonia. Mad, mad creatures!”

Before either of us can speak, she tugs us into the house, shutting the door. Then she pulls me further away, her hand too tight for me to believe she is merely concerned about my health.

“Now you go upstairs, lass,” she says, her eyes boring into mine, “and dry yourself off. Then straight to bed, lest you catch cold. Riding off into a storm, what nonsense! Ach!”

“Good night, Rose,” Conrad says, his voice ragged. He is flushed and wide-eyed, watching me with an intent expression.

With another warm shiver, I plod up the steps, thinking the best thing for me now would be a dash of cold water to my burning face, and I hope the basin in my room isn’t empty. But then whispering from the kitchen catches my ear. I stop where I am, holding my breath.

“... is not your concern, Mrs. MacDougal.” Conrad’s voice is as brittle as ice.

“I’m trying to help you, lad. That girl is trouble. I don’t trust her. Something about her just doesn’t add up. Shedisturbedthe peace of this house, as if she had a right to it. I have it on authority she broke a vase and hid it in a bureau!”

“A vase?Really?That’s what all this is about?”

“Someone has to shake some sense into you! What are you doing, lad? You can’t get distracted. Not now, with the Briar King rattling the windows.”

“You think I don’t know that?” Conrad’s tone is hard. “I’ll do what I must, as I always have. But when doIget to be happy?”

The ensuing silence stretches so long I begin to pull back, fearing they suspect me of eavesdropping.

But then Mrs. MacDougal says in a low, weary voice, “I know your passions are getting the better of you, just as I knowsheis the cause of it. Remember where your duties lie, and remember—no one from the outside can be trusted.”

“Aye, I know where my duties lie, and I know I’ll never experience anything of the world beyond this moor. I’ve accepted that, with all the misery and frustration that goes with it. But I want to do what bringsmejoy, just for once, and maybe Rose makes me happy. In any case, it’s not your decision to make, ye ken?”