He grunts and shuts my door behind him. I observe how tense his shoulders are and how stiff every step he takes toward my desk is.
“Is there a reason for your unease?”
“Do you always do that?”
“Do what?”
“Call people out like that.”
“Yes.”
“Why?”
“I can read people’s body language quite accurately, but I don’t always get the motivation behind it correct. Just now, I assumed your tension was because you were preparing to attack me or as I called out, filled with unease. Unease seemed like the more likely scenario.”
He stares at me. I allow him to observe all he wants and needs. It’s clear he’s struggling to get an understanding of me.
“I have no reason to attack you.”
“I’m aware. Hence why I went with my second assumption. As I said.”
He sucks his teeth and the sound grates on my ears, but I don’t say anything. I imagine even after yesterday’s apologies and time spent together—undrugged—that wasn’t enough time for him to fully trust us.
We must try harder to get these men to at least tolerate us.
More so Riven.
For Thayla’s and Yemi’s benefits.
“Okay then. Well, I was just stopping by to give you this back.”
From his pocket, he produces the agreement made on my brothers’ and my behalf. I’ve been more occupied with Thayla than worried about that, but I had wondered if he was going to give it back without me asking.
“You didn’t mention anything about it yesterday,” I comment as I take it from his hand.
“You made it clear you weren’t telling your brothers or Binder about it, so I figured I shouldn’t bring it up either. Not that it would matter anyway.”
“Does that mean you didn’t find anything?”
“I don’t believe anything helpful.”
“You never know what small detail can be helpful, Nero. I’d appreciate you voice whatever concern or even conspiracy you may think you came across.”
“There are no conspiracies, I can assure you. As far as agreements go, that one is airtight in terms of not being able to sever it. Are you aware of which Beginning God wrote it?”
“Multiple contributed to it.”
He hums and nods. “That’d make sense. There’s no doubt in my mind the Goddess of Accord had her hand in this.”
I don’t elaborate. She did.
As did the other two Beginning Goddesses.
“Is that observation relevant?”
He again stares at me and at this point, he’s making me feel like nothing more than a piece of art he can ponder over.
“I assume you noticed the many terms written and how they all are loose in the definition of consequences depending on who breaks them?”
