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So I do. Not every detail. But enough.

“Did my brother pressure you into helping him conceal it?”

Gage sits up straighter beside me. I don’t hesitate. “No. Encourage and advise, yes. Pressure, no.”

“You don’t pressure Jubilee into things,” he informs her, and my insides blush.

I shrug. “It’s true. He can’t even pressure me into using a damn coaster.”

He drags his knuckles along my cheek, igniting tingles across my skin, and darkly adds, “Your backside might disagree.”

Oh, God. Heat floods me head to toe, competing with pure mortification. I recover what’s left of my dignity, nip his fingers, and mutter, “Smart-ass.”

“Nine.”

We both turn to her. She hasn’t moved a muscle.

“That gets her a nine?” Gage demands.

“She answered what I asked instead of giving me the morally attractive version. And she can handle you.” A pause. “And won’t let you get a big head.”

Nothing helps the red flooding my cheeks.

A small tortoiseshell squeezes beneath the office door at that exact moment, bounds across the floor, and climbs Maisie’s leg like a ladder. Without looking away from me, this eerily composed woman opens both arms. The cat crawls up her chest, drapes over her shoulder, and starts chewing her hair while she scratches beneath its chin.

Very interesting.

Her focus crosses to Gage, and some fluent sibling telepathy passes through them. He kneads his eyes. “Please don’t dock her points for this next thing, Maise. I’m chalking it up to acute post-traumatic corpse brain.”

I do a double-take. “Excuse me?”

“The night we met,” he says with pained theatrics, “I asked Jules if she liked cats. And she informed me that only a psycho wouldn’t like cats.”

The silence grows thicker. Not like a blanket. Like a blade. I consider Maisie, and her eyes meet mine. Then her mouth begins to spread. It’s nothing like her brother’s grin. This is sharper. Feral, inch by little inch, until teeth appear while nothing else about her changes.

Nobody speaks. She doesn’t blink. And I find myself leaning across the desk.

Without moving any other muscles, she lifts both brows. “Boo.”

I don’t flinch, but my jaw comes unhinged. Very slowly, I turn toward Gage. Oh. My. God, I mouth, and the bastard has the audacity to smirk.

Exhilarated beyond all compare, I whip back toward her. “ASPD?”

Maisie sniffs. “Officially? Yes.”

“And psychopath?”

She gives a crisp nod. “High factor-one psychopathic traits. That fits me better in some ways. ASPD and psychopathy overlap, but they’re not interchangeable.”

I scoot my chair closer, insides jittering. “So you actually prefer psychopath?”

“Usually.” She strokes the cat draped across her shoulder. “People hear ASPD and make assumptions anyway. At least when I say psychopath, I get to shock them personally. It saves time.”

A laugh bursts out of me before I can stop it. I gesture at the building around us. “Crazy Cat Lady. That’s very good. Your idea or his? I’m guessing yours.”

“Neither of us, believe it or not.”

Maisie relocates the cat half an inch without any change in expression. I should pace myself. I don’t. “So, do you feel empathy?”