‘I shouldn’t have asked.’
‘If you like Roman, I’ll look the other way.’
‘Idon’tlike him like that.’Jules blinks, frowns.‘Do you?’
‘No.’He can tell Jules doesn’t buy it.‘We need to get back.’
‘Fine.’
?
Lachlan has become a master of his adjusted sphere.
He manages these fucking parties so well now.He handles each new element of the gatherings, the people and the security all while keeping eyes on Jules and checking in on Mimi.
But Jules’ behaviour over the last two weeks both improves and nosedives.
In terms of difficulty, it’s a massive improvement.
He’s become impeccably well-behaved.No sneaking out.No back-talk.Nothing.Jules is polite, obedient and eerily docile unless instructed otherwise, but this isn’t improvement, not really.
Jules is just slowly giving up.
He’s lost interest in almost everything.Lachlan never sees him reading anymore, doesn’t blame him, the books his father gave him were hideous.He never sees him in the pool anymore, only sunbathing beside it.He never sees him with Mimi, doesn’t play with her anymore.Jules never sketches, not even on paper.He barely eats.He hardly sleeps.Even when he’s with Roman, Vasily and Savannah, he seems so tired.
With the old man micromanaging what was once entirely Lachlan’s domain, there’s little he can do beyond trying to talk to Jules, and even that yields mixed results.They’re hardly ever alone anymore.If Lachlan tries to speak with him, it’s while moving from one place to another where Jules can feign distraction, and on the rare occasions he does engage, they barely get a moment before someone interrupts.
His father is constantly directing Jules elsewhere.Be with the Sorrenko boys.Take Ariadne walking around the grounds.Sit with Savannah beneath the old oak tree.Be where he wants, how he wants, who he wants.
Lachlan finds himself missing the arrogant brat who spat in his face, whose cleverness left Lachlan genuinely thunderstruck at times, having to backtrace via satellites to locate him.The kid with the fire in his heart, all brittle anger, sly cleverness and watery resentment.
Alistair knew exactly how to wear him down, and Lachlan hates it.
But he can’t do anything about it until the old man leaves, so he focuses on what hecando, which is keep his little girl safe.Mimi and Blaire are his touchstones to humanity and the more time Mimi spends with “Bee”the more she opens up to Blaire, the pair bonding beautifully.
Even so, Lachlan has the sneaking suspicion no one will ever compare to him in her eyes.The way Mimi beams whenever she sees him.How she runs stronger and faster thanks to fresh air, sunshine and swimming strengthening her legs, and how whenever she runs, it’s towards him.
Then there’s their secret language, which she’s absorbed almost instantly.Fingers.Hands.Eyes.He knew she’d pick it up quickly, but her grasp of the basics is still startlingly good.He reinforces it every day, always introducing another sign or two.Blaire says she wants to learn as well, which Lachlan likes very much, a way to speak without being overheard.
It’s a borrowed language they’ll likely never speak with true fluency, but even imperfect secrecy is valuable in a place like this.
Mimi can fall asleep on her own.She still talks to Mari every day, locked in the box that Lachlan used to store his own personal handgun in.Her hair is longer and wavier now that there’s weight to it.
‘Daddy, I want a knife,’ she says the morning of the last party in August for which Lachlan has been thoroughly preparing.They’re walking outside before the heat kicks up dangerously high.She hates sunscreen and would rather stick to the shade and wear coconut oil like Blaire suggested.
‘What kind of knife, baby?’he asks, casting about for a good stick, she always favours the shorter, thicker ones.‘You wanna play swords?’
‘No, a real one.’
Lachlan bends to pick her up and sit her on his hip.He’s not surprised, nor is he horrified.Nothing about this place, this world or these kids is normal.
‘What kind do you want, princess?’
‘Like yours.’
Sheloveshis KA-BAR.
‘Hmm, maybe for your birthday I’ll get you a little one.’
