Page 66 of Split or Swallow

There was a pause, and he stepped even closer.

“I’m not going to kiss you. Instead I’m going to picture everything I want to do to you without that dress on. And I’m going to pretend that someday you’ll let me do it.”

Her throat tightened. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t think.

“You were wrong about one thing, though,” Leo continued, his voice eerily calm.

“What’s that?” Tem managed to say.

Leo took her hand in his, turning it over and pressing his lips to the freckles on her palm. He murmured his next words against her skin:

“I know exactly why I like you.”

Then he disappeared into the parlor.

Tem stood alone, her heart thrumming in her chest. There were no words to describe what had just happened. It was as if an invisible thread now connected her to Leo—as if his vulnerability and candor had weakened her defenses against him. She couldn’t have predicted a single second of this evening, and she had no idea how she felt about anything anymore.

Tem was just turning to leave when she heard a voice in the parlor. She froze, her hand on the door. The voice belonged to Maximus. He was speaking in a hushed tone—practically whispering. She paused, listening hard as he said:

“You are enamored with her.”

“How do you know? You’ve barely spent ten minutes with us.”

“I know you, Thelonius. I have seen you like this before.”

A pause. Then Leo said:

“If you have seen me like this before, then you know what I’m going to do.”

“You cannot choose her.”

“And why not?” Leo countered, his voice considerably louder. “If I can’t make my own choice then what’s the point of the elimination process?”

“She’s a chicken farmer.”

“So?”

“You are only doing this because you know it will anger me.”

A pause.

“Maybe that’s part of the fun,” Leo said coldly.

Tem heard the clink of a glass, and wondered if whiskey had been poured.

“I will not have you repeat the mistakes of your past,” Maximus continued.

“Evelyn was not a mistake.”

The king let out a dull laugh. “You were a fool then, and you are a fool now.”

Another pause. When Leo spoke, his voice was laced with hate:

“I let you control me once. I won’t let you do it again.”

“We have a reputation to uphold, Thelonius. This is not how things are done. ”

“Things are done the way we say they are. Isn’t that what you’re always telling me? Laws are made to be broken.”