Adam is happy.
I take another drink. The wine is good. Hex has excellent taste in wine, which is one of the many things about him that I find profoundly irritating.
“It’s nothing dangerous,” I say.
Hex makes a small sound that might be agreement or might be skepticism. It’s hard to tell with him sometimes.
“Felix,” Adam says carefully. “If you need help with something...”
“I don’t.”
The words come out sharper than I intended. Adam flinches slightly. I immediately feel terrible, which makes me even more irritable.
“I’m fine,” I add, in a tone that is attempting to be softer and probably isn’t succeeding. “It’s just research. Expanding my skills. You know how it is.”
Adam doesn’t know how it is. Adam is not a witch. But he nods anyway because Adam is kind and worried and my best friend, and I am lying to him in his own kitchen while drinking his wine.
I’m a terrible person.
Hex turns back to the stove. He adds something else to the pan. The smell of cooking vegetables fills the kitchen, warm and ordinary and completely at odds with the tension sitting between my shoulder blades.
“The dark moon is soon,” Hex says conversationally.
I keep my expression carefully neutral. “Is it?”
“Three days.”
“How interesting.”
“Quite.” He stirs the pan with lazy precision. “Dark moons are excellent for certain types of spell work. Binding spells, for instance. Summoning rituals. Anything that requires pulling something from one place to another.”
My heart is hammering in my chest. I take a sip of wine and keep my voice level. “I wouldn’t know. That’s not really my area.”
Hex glances at me. Those red eyes are glowing slightly brighter than they were a moment ago. “Isn’t it?”
The kitchen is very quiet. Even the vegetables have stopped sizzling.
Adam is looking between us with an expression that suggests he knows something is happening but can’t quite identify what. His fingers are tight around his wine glass.
“Felix,” he says quietly. “Whatever you’re planning...”
“I’m not planning anything.”
“You’re a terrible liar.”
That’s rich coming from Adam, who once tried to convince me he wasn’t in love with the shadow creature currently cooking dinner in his kitchen. But I don’t say that. I just drain my wine glass and set it down on the counter with more force than necessary.
“I appreciate the concern,” I say. “But I’m handling it.”
“Handling what?” Adam’s voice has that edge to it now. The worried edge. “Felix, seriously, if something’s wrong...”
“Nothing’s wrong.”
“Then why won’t you tell us what you’re working on?”
Because you’ll try to stop me. Because you’ll say it’s dangerous and reckless and that I’m letting my anger make decisions for me. Because I don’t know what Hex’s opinion will be but I do know he will look at me with thoseancient knowing eyes and see exactly what I’m doing and exactly why I’m doing it and I can’t stand the thought of being that visible right now.
“It’s private,” I say instead.
