I gazed down at the piano, dragging a finger over one key. “Someday?”
“Tell you what, if you can ever pin me in a fight, maybe I’ll teach youChopsticks.”
“Finally!” I said, a grin pulling itself to the surface. “Some motivation!”
The edge of his mouth flickered like he wanted to smile, but he just shook his head. “Isstaying alivenot motivation enough for you?”
“Obviously not.”
With a sigh, he motioned me toward our training room. After he lit the candles, we faced each other.
“So…about the other night,” I said.
“What about the other night?”
“It went exactly like you said.”
His gaze flickered over my face, curious. “As has everything else I’ve told you about.”
“But you didn’t kill anyone.”
He paused, head cocked. “You asked me not to.”
I blinked. “I— You did that for me?”
A moment passed in which his expression morphed from impassive to incredulous, like I was the stupidest creature on the planet. “No. I did that for me.”
Butterfly wings fluttered in my chest while I searched his face for a telltale twitch, any sign of a lie.
He let out a long exhale. “Contrary to what you might believe, I don’tlikekilling people, Sophia. Didn’t realize that needed to be stated out loud, but I’d like it on the record.”
Words stuck in my throat. What did one say to an executioner who admitted to disliking it? I stammered out, “Right. I didn’t think…you?—”
He raised a hand. “Just stop. How is she?”
I took a breath and shook myself. “Extremely annoying, if I’m being honest. There was a desperate moment in the middle of the night when she was screaming at us that I wished we’d let you keep her.”
He chuckled. “Bad enough I had her for three days. She’s a handsy little creep. No one taught her about personal space. I had to order her to sit in a corner so she’d stop touching me.”
“She called me a bushy-headed whore.”
His lips pressed together, but the amusement escaped anyway, in little crinkles around his eyes and twinkles in the aquamarine.
“You think it’s funny?”
“Just…picturing your response.”
I stomped my foot. “She’s the worst! She kept referring to us asdirty sluts, so I told her she was a waste of her dad’s spunk.”
His laugh was a sudden, powerful thing, like a crash of thunder. “She’s just a kid. You’re insulting her with…semen?”
I rolled my eyes. “She clearly has no problem with jizz, Lucas, since she was so intent on getting yours.”
The laughter died as he shuddered.
“Do you realize she believes she’d be happier as a slave to you than free with us?” I said. “She begged us to give her back to you.”
He shrugged. “She’s been brainwashed. She’s young enough. She’ll see the truth eventually.”
