Page 22 of Legacy Elite

"Both of you. Official. The same night."

"Yes," Torres says.

Renzo puts his hand up. "That's a mechanical question and I have several follow-ups."

"It isn't a mechanical question," Luke says.

"The follow-ups are."

Declan has stood up. Declan, who is six foot four and has never once used his size to intimidate, is beaming at me like I've been given an award.

"That's brilliant," he says. "Jess. That's brilliant."

"Declan—"

"No, it is. Two of them. What are the odds?"

"Astronomically bad," Freya says. "That's rather the point."

"You knew," I say to her.

"I knew something." She opens her book again, without reading it. "I didn't know that."

Sophia rounds on Torres.

"And you."

"Me," Torres agrees.

"You moved countries and didn’t mention this."

"I did."

"You packed up your entire life at Frosthaven and came back here and let me talk about the café."

"It's a good café."

"IT ISN'T. IT'S A TERRIBLE CAFÉ."

Torres is enjoying this more than I have ever seen him enjoy anything.

Luke, meanwhile, has the expression of a man who has walked into a room expecting one outcome and is now watching people discuss his private life at volume.

"Are we finished?" he says.

"We are nowhere near finished," Sophia says.

"I was afraid of that."

And then Freya says, quietly, from the window seat, "Wait."

The room turns.

"The night before the Trial," she says. "And then you all left. For four months."

"...Yes."

Nobody says anything for a moment. Even Sophia.