Mean.
That was the price of doing it Maisie’s way.
I could pay it.
I bent close enough that only she could hear. “If we don’t leave now, I’m going to kiss you again.”
Her breath caught. Then her smile turned wicked. “Threat or promise?”
My hands flexed. Lorkin groaned somewhere behind me. “For the love of every dead god, take her home.”
Maisie laughed again, brighter this time, and I led my mate out of the courthouse into the gold morning.
14
MAISIE
“You’re lookingat the buggy like it betrayed you,” Kazan said as he put his truck into park.
“I haven’t driven it yet.”
“You’ve had a busy few days.”
“That’s no excuse. A woman should drive her own buggy before she nearly gets dragged off-world by her terrible ex.”
His mouth twitched. “I’ll remember that for the next one.”
“The next terrible ex?”
“The next buggy.”
I turned my head against the seat and looked at him. He was too big for the cab; one horn nearly brushing the roof. I still wasn’t used to how beautiful he was. I didn’t think I was ever going to be, and that was frankly inconvenient.
“I’m going to drive it everywhere,” I told him. “Into town for one thing. Maybe two if I’m feeling wild.”
“That’s what it’s for.”
“Freedom errands.”
His tail flicked. “Whatever you want.”
That did something to me. It kept doing something to me every time he said it.Whatever you want.Like it was easy. Like wanting wasn’t a thing I needed permission to do.
We went inside.
The cottage was warm, hearth banked low, the big front room full of light. When I turned around, Kazan was standing in the middle of the room like he’d been invited into someone else’s house.
His hands opened. Closed. Opened again. On a man of his size, uncertainty wasnotsubtle.
“Ask me,” I said.
His eyes lifted to mine. “Ask you what?”
“Whatever you’ve been swallowing since the courthouse.” I crossed the room, leaving my boots by the door because apparently I lived here now. “You said a word. Nezara heard it. I heard it. Then everybody got distracted by the legal disaster that was James, which was rude, frankly.”
His lips parted, but I held up a hand.
“No. I’m serious. I’m done being the last person to know things about my own life. James decided what I could handle. My parents decided what was proper. The Agency tried to decide where I belonged. I’m not doing it again. So if there’s something I need to know, tell me.”
