“So you were never my enemy…” I stop, biting my lip. “But what are you now?”
He glances toward the door.
“Give me a week,” he says. “A week of being a secret. Then…I’ll get back to you.”
“And until then?”
He frowns. “Meaning…?”
I try to play it cool, but I’m blushing. “I’m…kind of used to an orgasm a day.At leastone.”
He lowers his voice. “Understood. In that case…I’ll message you tonight after Solvi goes to bed.”
And it really,reallyshouldn’t be hot…
…but it is.
CHAPTER 21
KAELION
There isno world in which I should be alright with what happened last night.
I have every reason not to do it again. Lyn is my subordinate; the university has strict rules against such relationships. Beyond that, I have a daughter…and I do not do casual, not when Solvi is here especially.
And Lyn…
Lyn is dangerous.
She scares me—quite literally. I’m often afraid that she’ll hurt herself. She is chaotic and she challenges me. She has a bright future ahead of her, whereas I’m established…settled. I have a life here that is steady and static, and she’s anything but.
…and she would hate that I’m thinking about her this way. As if we have a future together.
I manage to sneak Lyn out while Solvi is distracted making breakfast, then it’s just the two of us—me and my incredibly suspicious daughter. It isn’t helped at all by Flicker, who raced into my bedroom at the first possible moment to smell the blankets as if accusing me of a crime. Now, Solvi keeps casting glances my way between every bite.
She accepted that I wasn’t going to tell her everything right away…but she doesn’t like it.
Solvi spirals a ribbon of shaved sandfruit around her fork, peering at me over the plate, eyes narrowed. The meal is her favorite, and I made it in a show of goodwill, but the favor seems to have only gone so far.
“You have questions,” I murmur.
She nearly spits out her food in her rush to respond. “Of course I do, Baba.”
I cock an eyebrow, tendrils twitching. “Is a week too long to wait?”
She stares at me, eyes the same color as mine, skin the same shade as Shahar’s…and I feel for all the world like I’m being interrogated by a perfected version of both of us.
Which, I suppose, I am.
“It doesn’t…” she pauses. “I did hear you last night, and I’m not a kid?—”
I wince. “Solvi…”
“Mata is so much worse with Wulfric,” she scoffs. “And she’s already talked to me about what adults do together and how I’m not supposed to do it until I’’m old enough, okay? So don’t freak out.”
I hear a raspy little growl from my bedroom—Flicker, I’m sure finding something she dislikes.
This just had to happen during the summer, didn’t it?
