Page 108 of Legacy Ascended

"Do you actually want the Council work? Or is it just the thing they handed you?"

"I want it," I say. "I'm not a reluctant heir pining for a cottage. I like chambers. I like the moment when a room stops arguing and starts drafting."

"Okay." She sounds pleased, which I hadn't expected. "So what's the problem?"

"The problem is that they've decided the work comes with a right of inspection over everything else." I get my arm around her. "It doesn't. I can do the Council work without giving them the rest of my life."

"Do you need my help with that?"

"God, no. You keep doing exactly what you're doing. I'll handle my family."

Jessica turns her face into my shoulder and laughs.

"Then I want something too," she says.

"Name it."

"This. When nothing's wrong." She pushes herself up on her right elbow and looks down at me. "I don't want to only do this after somebody gets kidnapped or everything goes to shit. I want an evening with you on the calendar, and I want you to be as annoying about protecting it as you are about everything else."

"That's the most romantic thing anyone has ever said to me."

My phone goes on the desk, twice, the double buzz that means the House office and not a person.

Jessica's eyes go to it. She doesn't say anything.

I ignore it and start proving I can focus on her, not just my house.

Chapter twenty

Jessica

Torres has decided that what this evening needs is eggs.

He's at the counter in the kitchen with his sleeves shoved up and a bowl against his ribs, beating eggs with a fork. There's bread under the grill, and he has already taken the last of the good butter from Sophia's shelf.

"That's Sophia's butter."

"I know."

"It has her name on it."

Torres glances at the empty dish. "That's how I knew whose it was."

"It's my butter," Sophia says from the table, where she's packing her bag.

"Was."

Sophia looks at him.

"I'll buy more, geez."

Luke is in the window seat with a book, his phone nowhere in sight. He hasn't looked up in several minutes and he's laughed twice. I think he stole the Penny Reid off my nightstand.

Sophia takes the butter dish with her out of spite, gets to the door, thinks about it, comes back, and puts it on the counter next to Torres without a word.

Then it's quiet. Three of the people who usually fill this room are in the Preserve tonight.

"I love her," Torres says.