“I’m aware.”
Shahar hums. “And what about you?”
“What about me?”
She peers at me, eyes narrowed. “How do you feel about it? Kae…something is going on. I can see it in your eyes, even now.”
I look away. I always do, when she starts talking like this.
“It’s irrelevant,” I say, turning back toward my office. “Whatever I feel—or don’t—isn’t the point.”
Shahar is frowning, clearly skeptical. “There's something you're not telling me.”
I groan. “Shahar?—”
“Tell me,” she says. “Please? I can tell it's killing you.”
I pause.
Look back toward the door to ensure Solvi isn't listening.
“The technology that hurt her,” I say carefully. “It…causes her to have an arousal reaction to me.”
Shahar’s brows shoot up.
“Don't laugh,” I warn.
She glues her mouth shut.
“This condition, to me, is coercive,” I go on. “It gives me even more power over her than I had before. I am…capable of making her feel things.”
“Sexual things,” Shahar confirms.
I nod.
“Well, Kae,” she says with a sly smile. “I can guarantee your capabilities in the bedroom aren't a result of a lab accident.”
I scowl, but she’s already laughing, shoulders shaking.
“Shahar.”
“I’m sorry,” she says, breathless. “Truly. But Kaelion, listen to yourself. You’re acting like youprogrammedher. Like you’re some kind of villain in one of Solvi’s comics. What happened was an accident.”
“That doesn’t change the outcome.”
“You’re so serious,” she says. “Sometimes I think if you just…enjoyedyourself for once?—”
“Says the woman who is marrying the most serious man in the galaxy,” I mutter, then raise my voice slightly. “I know you’re listening, Wulfric!”
He grunts in response, somewhere in the background.
“He would come over to say hello, but he is not wearing a scrap of clothing right now,” Shahar says with a smug smile. “Can’t imagine you lounging around in the nude.”
“You don’t know what I do in my private time.”
“Yes I do,” she shoots back. “You read articles and review data, fully clothed.”
I scowl.
