Page 65 of Katherine the Vixen

Katherine let out a cry of frustration. “No. He just said you had dismissed me and left with the horses. Oh, how cruel of him to allow me to believe you had gone just like that… I thought…”

Suddenly Katherine remembered the way her father had looked at her when he had encouraged her to “do what she had to do.” She understood now that he had wanted her to fight for the man she wanted, to be brave enough to go after him if the alternative was losing him. He had forced her to make the choice she had not been able to make.

A smile came to tease her lips. She had been right that day, looking at the sea. She could make her own destiny, after all. She had already started, by running to Siaspar as soon as she could, despite the odds stacked against them.

“Don’t be too angry at him,” Siaspar murmured, coming a step closer. “I think he wanted you to be sure of what you wanted. It was wise, because unfortunately, this is not going to be easy. I’m still⁠—”

“I do know what I want,” she cut in. She wanted him. How could he doubt it? “I rushed out of the cottage as soon as he told me you were gone.”

“You rushed out? Does that mean I am allowed to hope?”

That he should be the one worried about what she thought tore at her heart. Only a moment ago, it had been her, worrying it was all over.

“You can hope,” she whispered, too moved to say more.

Siaspar took her hands in his, looking as overwhelmed as she felt. “Katherine Robertson, will you allow me to court you once I am free from my accursed wife?”

So he did know her name. How? And he was only asking for a chance to woo her, to court her like a suitor, rather than ask or even demand that she marry him… It was too good to be true.

“Yes, of course, I will.”

And she already knew where that courting would lead.

“God, I did everything the wrong way round, didn’t I?” he said with a small, deprecative laugh. “I bedded you before I even met you, I distrusted you before giving you chance to explain yourself, I talked to your father before I even told you what I felt for you. I would understand if you had no time for me.”

“I wouldn’t. Because you did everything the only way you could.”

“Katherine. There is no one else like you.”

With those words, he drew her into his arms. Katherine molded herself against him, feeling she was finally where she belonged.

“But you’re a lord,” she said, her mouth against his chest. This was still an unavoidable fact. “How can you want⁠—”

“I’m a brewer’s grandson before anything else, and I have never wanted anything more in all my life.”

“Can it be true?”

“So true that I’m going to kiss you.”

Finally, after two nights in his arms, after weeks obsessing about it, after all the doubt and pain she had gone through that day, Katherine tasted Siaspar’s lips. She had imagined that moment a hundred times and yet the reality still managed to surprise her. Everything was good, everything felt right. His taste was sweet, his tongue wicked, his embrace loving.

This kiss could only have ever been a kiss from Siaspar and she never wanted it to stop.

To add to her delight, he seemed as keen to kiss her as she was to kiss him. He had drawn her against him, supporting her waist with a strong arm and was cradling the back of her neck with careful fingers. This was not her first kiss, but it was what a first kiss should feel like.

Knowing that Siaspar loved her as much as she loved him, that he desired her, made this moment the most exquisite of her life.

His lips, surprisingly soft, left hers and started a decadent exploration. They followed a path along her jaw before nipping at her earlobe, caressed the side of her neck before brushing against her cheek, teased her bottom lip before finally coming back to worship her mouth. Every time he kissed her somewhere new, a tiny spark lit up in her loins. Did every couple feel this way the first time they kissed or was this something only she and Siaspar could experience? She did not care, as long as she got to experience it.

Soon, too soon, he drew away.

“Catrin.” Oh, she loved how he used that name. It was as if he was giving her a new identity, making her his. “Fy Catrin.”

Yes, she was his Catrin. In that moment, she felt new, reborn—and in love for the first time, even if she could not have pinpointed the exact moment she had fallen.

It could have been the day he had told her she reminded him of a dragonfly. Or when she had run to him to stop the blood from flowing from his wrist. It had seemed as if her own life had depended on saving him. She could even have fallen in love with him as early as on that second night together, when he had kissed her temple.

It did not matter anyway. What mattered was that she had finally come to see it and that, against all odds, Siaspar loved her back. She tried to imagine her family’s reaction when they arrived together to announce their marriage. Her siblings would be bewildered, her father would be quietly satisfied, her mother incredulous—and probably somewhat sheepish at her lack of faith in her son-in-law’s feelings.