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“Honored to be torn apart? That’s new.”
He says it more to himself, but he knows she heard it.
“I’ve survived worse.”
Everyone looks at her all at once. Beside her, Reese pauses with his glass halfway to his mouth. It’s a welcome shock that she would offer up such information. Her eyes dart to mine, and I hold her gaze as if I were holding her hand.
“You don’t know that.” Lucian draws her attention back. His stupid grin makes her eyes lower to her plate. She’s trying to disappear again.
Marcus is less subtle. “He didn’t tell you you’re gonna be fucked in front of everyone, did he?”
Reese shoots him a look across the table.
Those big gray eyes widen, but she quickly hides the reaction, revealing it only in the tightening of her fingers around the napkin in her lap.
“Not in those words,” she says carefully.
She looks over to me, her lips thinning.
“It was implied,” I state.
Marcus huffs a laugh. “Convenient.”
“Looks like she’ll need a lot of training.” Lucian throws that out there to no one in particular as he stabs at his food with his fork.
“That’s enough.” Grandpa Wallace’s eyes trail to every person sitting here, silently threatening. “I will not have this vulgarity at my table.”
That would mean more if he hadn’t helped build our entire world around it.
Liam cuts in smoothly. “The Dominion Trials are about far more than that, I assure you,” he says, turning to Zaiya with a steadier kind of attention than the others have given her. “They test loyalty. Connection. Sacrifice. What a person can withstand. What they are willing to give.”
He studies her face, looking past her composure for comprehension.
“I have faith that the sister of one of our members is fully capable of competing,” he adds. “And I assume you understand that nothing here is given without cost.”
Zaiya holds his gaze. There’s grief under her expression, but it doesn’t weaken her. It only makes her look more serious.
“I do.”
Tristan sets down his glass after a slow sip of red wine. “The Crotaveres have always stood at the center of the Order. Sovereign and Seraph. It would be a disgrace to lose that now.”
He sounds bored by the idea. Like he’s reciting something drilled into us since birth rather than offering an opinion of his own.
As if she needs reminding that my desire is not the only force claiming her.
Zaiya’s shoulders draw back, posture straightening by a degree. “I won’t let you down.”
One corner of his mouth lifts without any real amusement. “Confidence is charming. We’ll see how you do under pressure.”
Tristan has developed a talent for making everything sound pointless lately. And they say I’m the one who’s been listlessly going through the motions of life.
My grandfather turns fully to her. “Failure isn’t an option we entertain.”
They keep at it, circling, prodding. And I let them prick at her soft skin to toughen it up. I need to know how she’ll face it.
Do you scare easily?
Are you loyal to him?
