She gestures to the pendant at her throat—the miniaturized version of her AI that I've learned to respect as both security measure and early warning system.
"She may be a small device, but she has all the fancy features. One thousand meter radius when I put her in that mode." A shrug, shoulders rolling with the liquid grace of someone whose body is constantly in motion. "Figured better safe than sorry."
I process the information.
She was with Sage.
Having sex with Sage.
While I was out here alone, dealing with threats, killing intruders without anyone to?—
The pout forms before I can stop it.
It's an unfamiliar expression—something I don't think my face has made in years—but apparently Seraphine brings out reactions in me that I didn't know I was capable of having.
Jealousy.
That's what this is.
I'm jealous that Sage got to enjoy her while I was doing security patrol.
I'm jealous that I'm out here covered in blood while he's in there, clean and satisfied, probably still smelling like her.
This is ridiculous.
This is beneath me.
This is exactly the kind of emotional attachment I was trained to avoid.
But I can't stop feeling it.
Seraphine tilts her head.
That bird-like motion that suggests she's cataloguing something—reading my expression, interpreting my body language, seeing through the carefully neutral mask I've spent years perfecting.
"Are you jealous?"
The question is direct.
Unflinching.
Exactly the kind of thing I'd expect from her.
She moves closer as she speaks—bare feet silent on the blood-stained grass, steps light and deliberate. Her body weaves through the aftermath of violence like she's navigating a dance floor, and I realize with a start that she's not wearing much.
Just a shirt.
Sage'sshirt, specifically.
The fabric is oversized on her small frame, hanging to mid-thigh, sleeves rolled up past her elbows. It's dark in color—navy, maybe—and it's clearly been worn recently, recently enough that Sage's vanilla-smoke scent still clings to the fabric.
Along with something else.
Something muskier.
Sex.
She smells like sex and cotton candy and violence, and it's doing things to me that I refuse to acknowledge.
