Page 24 of Deathless & Divided

“But I always come with Theo,” Lily whispered.

Most of Damian’s friends didn’t let their kid sisters hang out with them, but since Theo and Lily didn’t have parents and Dino was too busy with whatever he did, Lily was always around. She didn’t have a lot of friends because she was too busy following her brother around. Damian didn’t mind since she was quiet.

Damian liked quiet people.

“The fence is rusty, too,” Damian said.

Theo groaned. “Great.”

“What does that mean?” Lily asked.

“Means we have to tell Uncle Ben so he can take you to the hospital.”

Lily’s brown eyes widened and tears started to well. “But—”

“You’re gonna need a needle, I think.”

“No!”

Damian winced. Whenever a girl cried, his stomach went weird. Girls shouldn’t cry. “It doesn’t hurt, right, Theo?”

Damian lied.

Those needles hurt a lot.

“Uh, right. It doesn’t hurt, little one.”

Lily sniffled again. “All right.”

Damian blinked out of the memory, surprised it had come back to him at all. A great deal of his childhood had somehow been lost to the recesses of his mind over the years. He didn’t have a lot to remember that he wanted to, really.

Did Lily remember him tagging around sometimes back then, too?

Damian, knowing she probably hadn’t heard his approach, cleared his throat quietly.

Lily didn’t even blink. “I figured Dino would come find me. Or maybe Theo. Definitely not you, anyway.”

“I wasn’t looking for you,” he said honestly. “My car is parked out back to avoid someone getting killed if they scratched my car.”

“Fascinating.”

“Really? Because you sound bored as hell.”

She also seemed a lot calmer than earlier.

Damian wondered what had changed for Lily in the span of a couple hours. He brushed it off. It didn’t matter. Damian had a job to do so that meant he had to go out and get the info needed to get it done as quickly as possible.

Resuming his walk down the hallway, Damian passed a quiet Lily by.

“Do they still call you little one?” he asked as he unlocked the backdoor and opened it.

Lily stilled but didn’t answer.

It was enough for Damian to know her brothers did still call her that.

Damian turned to face her. The breeze from the outside wafted into the hallway and blew the scent of Lily’s flowery perfume through the space. She watched him from under her thick, dark lashes and he wondered if she wanted to bolt as far away from him as she could.

There wasn’t a whole lot of space in the hallway, so turning like he did put him directly in front of her. Lily had to look up and Damian could plainly see the anger still warring in her gaze. It made her all the more pretty with just a glimmer of defiance behind her brown gaze. The frustrated pout of her lips demanded attention.