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Sera smiled, but not her usual lovely smile. It was awkward and timid, somehow both bashful and proud.
“I know exactly why Elyse was there.” She sent Manny a sideways glance as she bit her lip. “She… She came to visit me the day before.”
“She what?” Killian exclaimed. The chair scraped against the floor as he stood, staring at Sera in disbelief. He could feel the heat rising to his cheeks. Manny merely shook his head, the same shock coating his features, only less enraged.
Sera raised her chin. “She came by the day before, and I told her about the visions.” Sera’s voice was remarkably confident, as if she hadn’t harbored a fugitive. “She wanted to know all about them—to help. I told her the only clue I had—about a statue of three figures. She must have figured out where the town was and gone to investigate.”
“Sera,” Manny sighed.
But Killian couldn’t speak. He couldn’t even think, he was so angry. Red tinged his vision, painting Sera’s bright apartment in shades of scarlet and vermillion. He’d known—he’d fucking known—that Sera couldn’t be trusted. What had she unraveled by sharing her visions with Elyse?
“You should have told us,” Manny said in a voice that was firm but not unkind.
“So you could lecture me?” Sera quipped, cocking a defiant brow.
But Killian leaned across the table. “Where is she?” he blurted out. His fingernails dug into the grains of wood beneath them. He gritted his teeth as he glared at her, waiting for an answer.
Both Sera and Manny looked taken aback by the aggression in his tone. Why wasn’t Manny more angry? And why was Sera acting like this wasn’t a massive act of treason?
“Where is she?” he growled again, his voice low and coated with anger.
“Well…” Sera said quietly, and something stirred in Killian’s ribs.
The moment before Sera’s eyes flickered toward her bedroom, the moment before Killian heard the soft click of boots, he sensed her presence. She was there. She was in the fucking apartment.
His back was to the bedroom door. He turned slowly, rotating his torso with control despite the savage chaos brewing within him. Elyse stood there, looking down at him in his chair, her chin held high, her expression stoic. Killian could feel his rage heating his blood, but he didn’t move or speak. Neither did Elyse. They just stared at each other for a long, long moment, tension pulling and pushing around them.
He hated how much he’d thought of her since seeing her in Prestowne. Hated that she hadn’t fought back, that she’d saved his life, that she’d pleaded with him to listen to her. He hated that she was breathing, and that she somehow managed to take his breath away. The endless confusion overwhelmed him, seizing his heart and clouding his mind.
And then his eyes fell to her hands, to the silver shackles that bound her wrists.
Killian nodded toward the cuffs. “What’s this?” he asked, his voice coming out weaker than he meant it to.
“A sign of good faith,” Elyse answered boldly, lifting her chin an inch higher.
If she was affected by his presence, she didn’t show it. Her voice was calm and even, her face neutral yet confident. It unnerved Killian to his core.
“The shackles are magic-suppressing,” Sera added. “Elyse is here to make a bargain, nothing more.”
He remained unconvinced. “What’s to stop me from taking her down to the palace dungeons right now?” he asked, speaking about her as if she weren’t standing before him, brimming with arrogance.
“You won’t,” Elyse answered. She took a small step toward him. “You won’t because you know that just by being here, I’m taking a great risk, and that I wouldn’t do so without a damn good reason.”
Killian scoffed. “Your ‘reasons’ are just manipulation,” he jeered. Even so, what she said resonated with him. The last time he’d seen her in shackles, when he tried to arrest her for King Cyril’s murder, she’d cut off and reattached her own hand just to avoid capture. He could still see the scars from where she’d done so, peeking out behind the silver metal on her wrists. If she’d gone to such lengths to escape arrest, why risk her freedom by presenting herself bound and impotent?
She had spun so many lies. She’d tricked him into believing she proclaimed her innocence under the influence of truth serum, yet she had been immune to the potion’s effects all along. She’d convinced him that she cared for him, even though she lied to him for weeks.
How could this be anything but a trick now?
“Just hear her out,” Sera said—a command, not a plea. “And to make sure you’re on your best behavior…” She held up a strip of leather with a pink crystal fastened to it—Killian’s crystal.
His hand shot immediately to his wrist where the leather bracelet should have been, but of course, it wasn’t there. Sera must have stolen it from him when he first arrived.
Vulnerability trickled into his veins. He’d only had the crystal for a few months, but he felt paralyzed without it. Since when had he become so attached to magic? The realization sickened him.
“My love,” Manny began, pinching the bridge of his nose with his fingers. “This is all so reckless—stupid even—but I must say, I’m impressed with your sleight of hand.”
Sera gave Manny a sly smile as she batted her lashes.
