Niall had never seemed to care about my magic, other than helping me keep it from overwhelming me. Our relationship had been about us, not my power or his shifting. I hadn't planned on falling for him, or moving in with him, or anything else. It just… happened.
We'd fucked the night we met, and when he came to my house, I didn't want him to leave. So he didn't. Not for long, anyway.
"Are you taking Niall's side?" I asked, mostly to change the subject.
"No. The situation changed the way you felt about him. I get it. That doesn't mean it was that simple for him."
I didn't particularly care if Jonah got it or not, to be honest.
Was that bad?
Probably.
Especially if we were fated mates.
But I hadn't missed the way he described my magic. As abuzz. Which I had definitely heard it described as before.
Maybe Niall was right. That the energizing thing was just another way my magic hit people.
Or maybe because Jonah and I were fated, he only felt it differently when my magic actively tried to hurt him. Callum's ice magic still affected Kat, she just liked the chill of it.
Who the fuck knew?
Not me. Obviously.
I felt less sure of everything by the moment. Other than how badly I missed Niall. That never seemed to change.
"You probably don't want to talk about this," Jonah said. "And I don't either..."
Dear lord, please let him not be bringing up the times we'd had terrible sex.
"But the villa is in a shit ton of debt because of Simon. We owe the monsters a lot of money. We've been working on a plan to get on top of it for months, but we're at a loss. If you have any ideas, or want to make a bargain..."
I frowned. "You owe the monsters money?"
"Unfortunately. I don't think we have any way to get out if it on our own, other than bankruptcy. We haven't been able to afford the minimum payments for over a year."
The monsters were fucking loaded.
"Wow. I'll... think about a bargain. Do you need an answer now?"
"Of course not. I didn't want to ask you, because I don't want you to feel pressured into it," he explained, and I could've laughed.
Or cried.
I was their only option, as far as bargains went from a fae who could afford it. There was no world in which Callum would pay off Simon's debt, even if Gwen asked nicely. Kat did well, but she gave the majority of the money she made to the people who worked for her.
Merrily mainly made bargains to help women by killing their abusers, without asking for anything in exchange. People all over Rumor whispered about it. Particularly in the Shadow District.
She bargained for political reasons too, sometimes, but she wouldn't make a deal that she genuinely expected someone to pay back. Callum was the only one of us who did that.
Darius bargained with literally anyone, but he was only interested in tiny, ridiculous bargains for the sake of discovering whether or not someone was his soulmate.
"Any more bombs to drop before we start the audiobook?" I asked, still holding the earbuds.
He considered it.
I rolled my eyes, and he grinned. "That's all I've got. What about you?"
