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She moved closer. “Feeling better yet?”
He pivoted toward her and watched her eyes sparkle with amusement as she brought her tumbler to her lips.
He took another hefty swig. “Not yet.” His gaze was caught by a modern painting above the table that held three decanters. “This looks familiar.” It was an abstract of an oak tree, beautiful, rugged, dramatic. For a long moment, he couldn’t keep his eyes off it. He saw movement as well, like wind through the leaves.
“I’ve seen this before. Somewhere.”
“Probably my father’s office if you were ever there. I believe you might have taken a class of his?”
“I did.”
“The two paintings are similar. I worked on them at the same time to explore some of the technique. But I took each a different direction depending on my mood.”
He turned toward her, his mouth agape. He waved his glass toward the two-foot-high painting. “Wait a minute. You did this?”
“Why do you look so surprised? No, shocked. You don’t think very much of me, do you?”
He held her gaze, but remained silent, considering. “You’ve had an easy life, Holly.”
“I know I’m young by Realm standards, but I don’t know anyone’s life that’s easy. And my father didn’t exactly pamper his children.” For whatever reason, her lips curved.
“Did you really call the ruling Mastyr of Tannisford a prick?”
He chuckled. “Guess I did.”
“And didn’t the same man once beat the crap out of you?” She sipped her whisky again. “So, what made you so mad?”
He stared into his glass, his jaw working all over again. “He pushed me about not having gone back to the Guard.”
She turned so that she faced him fully. “So, why didn’t you?”
He saw and felt the accusation, same as Stone. He’d been asked that question a hundred times. He responded as he always did. “I had better things to do.”
“Like riding your bike?”
“My Harley? That’s one of them.”
“Whoring?”
“That’s definitely another one and I won’t apologize for it. I like women.”
He expected her to give him a dressing down, instead she frowned.
“What is it this time?”
She shook her head. “Something my father once said to me.” She seemed reluctant to continue.
“Spill it. I respect Professor McCrae”
She appeared to think for a moment, then shrugged. “He believes a man who chases a lot of women has a hole in his heart so deep all his realm goodness has started to leak out.”
He finished his whisky and set the tumbler on the console by the decanters. He squeezed his eyes shut and rubbed his forehead.
He didn’t want the memories to come but they rushed over him anyway like a tsunami, like they always did, just as they’d done earlier at Stone’s house. He could still smell the bodies of his dead sons burning on the pyre. Their throats had been torn out viciously.
“Rez, I’m sorry.” He felt her hand on his arm.
“What are we going to do here? You and me?”
