The Oracle watched him go through the window. When she turned back to us, old grief softened her expression.
"Tragic what happened to the man he loved once," she said quietly. "The boy was murdered for his engagement ring. Lagos bled in the weeks that followed, but no amount of killing could bring him back."
The kitchen went quiet.
Under the table, Rafael's fingers tangled with mine and squeezed.
I didn't pull away.
The storm let uplong enough for us to make it back to the safe house, beignets in hand.
I was eating my third beignet when Diego stood up and stretched and said, "Well, Jasper and I are going to get more beignets."
Across the small kitchen table, Rafael's hand tightened on his coffee mug. He hadn't looked at me directly since we'd sat down, just stared at his untouched coffee like it held answers neither of us wanted to hear.
"We just ate beignets," Jasper said without looking up from his laptop.
"Different beignets. Come on, guapo." Diego grabbed Jasper's jacket.
Jasper glanced between us. "Ah. Privacy. Yes." He closed his laptop with a click and stood.
Diego paused at the door. "Don't do anything I wouldn't do, which leaves you basically everything. Oh, and Rafael? Try not to overthink it for once in your life."
The door closed behind them. Their footsteps retreated down the porch stairs. Diego's laughter drifted back through the storm, then faded completely.
Then it was just me and Rafael and the sound of rain hammering the roof. Thunder rolled closer, shaking the windows in their frames. The lights flickered once, twice, then steadied, leaving us in the dim amber glow of the single bulb over the table.
I reached for another beignet just to have something to do with my hands. The powdered sugar stuck to my fingers. I brought them to my mouth without thinking, licking the powdered sugar away.
When I glanced up, Rafael was staring. Not at my face. At my mouth. His knuckles had gone white around the coffee mug. His breathing had become faster. Shallower.
Say something.
But my throat had closed up completely. Every word I could think of sounded wrong. Too casual. Too heavy. Too revealing.
"So," Rafael managed finally. "That was subtle."
"Diego means well. Even when he's being obnoxious about it."
Rafael's smile faded. He finally looked up from his coffee, and when his eyes met mine, the air left my lungs in a rush.
His eyes were red-rimmed, carrying too much weight. But underneath the exhaustion was something else, something that made heat race down my spine and my balls feel heavy.
Want. Raw and desperate and barely controlled.
"I've been thinking," he said quietly. His voice had dropped lower. "About what Rhadamanthys said."
I swallowed. "Yeah?"
"We're going into the labyrinth." His hands tightened on the mug again. The ceramic creaked louder this time. "Chained together against Constantine and whatever he brings." He paused. He swallowed hard. "There's a very real chance we don't come out."
I wanted to tell him that wasn't true, that we'd survive, that I'd make sure he survived even if I didn't. But the words stuck in my throat because they might be lies, and I'd never lied to him about anything that mattered.
"I know," I said instead.
Rafael set down his coffee mug and went to the window. Lightning lit him up for a second, and he looked…fierce. Handsome and terrifying and wrecked all at once. He looked like more than I deserved.
My cock stirred despite everything. I wanted him. I'd wanted him since Rome, since the warehouse, since he'd looked at me across a blood-splattered study and promised to make me surrender.
