One thing was certain, Evangeline never wanted Hades to know about her feelings for him. It only made it worse that she wasn't even sure what those feelings truly were. Love, perhaps. Or admiration stretched too far, mistaken for something deeper simply because it had nowhere else to go.
Either way, both possibilities were dangerous, and neither had a future she could survive unscathed.
The last thing she wanted was to be rejected outright, or worse, to be dismissed quietly and assigned work far from his side, exiled without cruelty but with finality. If she had known it would come to this, she would have crushed the jealousy in her chest the moment it bloomed. She would have turned herself into stone, unmoving and unfeeling, long before Lady Cerdery's name ever took root in her thoughts.
But regret came too late. Now, all she could do was fix it, whatever it was.
