Wastefully indulgent.
Jules dresses beautifully.His suit is sharply tailored to make him look a little older than he is, shoulders slightly padded.Dark auburn hair has been styled properly for once, pushed back in soft waves that expose the elegant shape of his face, while subtle eyeliner and contour sharpen the natural beauty he already carries into something far more alluring.Beneath the ballroom lights, his amber eyes catch gold like expensive liquor.He doesn’t look eighteen.Lachlan supposes that’s very much the point.
Mimi wears a miniature ballgown with tights and slippers plus a pretty silver tiara.She had to leave Mari behind sitting beside a handheld radio, the twin of which Lachlan has in his pocket so she can talk to him if she likes.
Lachlan starts off holding Mimi’s hand but she’s nervous around so many people so it’s less than five minutes before he picks her up and sits her on his hip where it feels like she belongs.They circulate with Jules, who comes alive in a new way Lachlan’s not seen before.
Charming, captivating, magnetic.It’s astonishing to watch.
Jules smiles wide, delicate fingers brushing over shoulders.He cocks his head, he flirts, he remembers everyone’s name.He is a kaleidoscope of social mastery and clockwork beauty, silken boy with the silver tongue.He leaves people intoxicated in his wake, has them staring after him when he moves on.
At some point, Alistair joins his children.
Jules seems well versed in what’s expected of him and the four people Alistair brought along with him are all given thecharm royaleby the eldest Penhalyx child, but when the old man tries to introduce Mimi, he calls her Jessamine and she hides her face in Lachlan’s neck.
Alistair doesn’t like that, Lachlan can tell.Doesn’t like that she won’t perform the way Jules does.Lachlan gently taps her lower back and whispers that if she’s a good girl they’ll radio check in with Mari right after.He feels her huff a breath, loves that she’s getting the same fire her brother has, but then she comes out from her hiding place and allows Lachlan to set her down so she can perform the little curtsey they practised together.Lachlan wore a skirt to make it fun.
‘Nice’a meet you,’ she says, no smile but neutral enough.
The four are charmed, cooing.‘What a little princess, sodarling.’
Jules picks Mimi up and praises her with a kiss.‘That was great, Mimikins.’
‘Such treasures you have, Alistair,’ one of the men remarks.Lachlan recognises him immediately as Thomas Whitlock, every guest at the party already committed to memory from the background checks.Whitlock lifts his champagne with a faint smirk, gaze sliding towards Lachlan.‘I see why you keep them so well guarded.’
Lachlan knows his role here; the faceless, nameless stone wall.He doesn’t introduce himself, knows better than to speak first to any of these people.
‘Lachlan Tanner, the new bodyguard.This one is particularly effective,’ Alistair introduces airily, ‘and takes well to fine tuning.’Another man steps forward, darkly handsome beneath the lights.Jet-black hair, deep brown eyes, impeccable tailoring.Lachlan recognises him at once as Mikhail Sorrenko, easily one of the better-looking monsters beneath this glass dome.‘Julian, you remember Mikhail?’
Jules’ smile comes on like a light.‘Of course.Mikhail, it’s so wonderful to see you again.’
Sorrenko, like everyone else gifted the nacreous sunlight of such attention, seems a little dazed.‘How you’ve grown,dorogóy moy.I recall your seventeenth.You were not yet so tall.’
‘Quite a spurt,’ Whitlock snickers.
Lachlan steadies himself by imagining punching Whitlock so hard he loses teeth.Mimi’s small hand is tucked securely in his while he stands there with practised patience.Sorrenko, at least, lacks the oily smarm of the others, but Lachlan still watches these people the way he’d watch something dangerous behind reinforced glass, technically human, yet separated from the rest of the world by something vast and rotten.
Sorrenko asks Julian, ‘And how is your Russian now?’
Jules tilts his head, somehow managing to look pretty even while pretending to think about it.Then he answers in smooth, fluid Russian, the accent precise enough to make clear he’s been trained properly.Sorrenko preens with delight, praises him in the same tongue and Alistair watches, undeniably pleased with the exchange and Jules’ performance.
They talk a little more.Whitlock swipes Jules’ chin with his thumb.Lachlan imagines how long he could keep him alive if he used transfusions.Alistair gives Jules an approving nod before he goes with his friends to mingle with others, but he ignores Mimi entirely.
Lachlan thinks it’s better that way anyway.
She’s uneasy around him.
‘Be Daddy for party?’she asks in a whisper when Lachlan picks her up again so they can circulate some more.
Lachlan sighs.
He really should put a stop to this, but he can’t.
‘Just for the party,’ he says, ‘and only insecretvoices.’
‘I know, I ‘member,’ she sighs, wrapping her arms around his neck to settle her head on his shoulder.It’s already nine, she’s usually in bed fast asleep by now.‘Me and Mari are gonna be bodygardens when we older.Have to be good at secrets.’
He can’t help the tiny smile that tugs on the corners of his mouth.He thinks often aboutbang bang.She feels like his daughter in every way.
