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Laughter danced in my ears, my own, unexpected and genuine. I helped by opening the box and pulling out latex-free clear gloves. I put them on his hands, and dubiously, he took out the rest of the bottles and went about shaking and mixing. Theo didn’t fumble, make faces, or comment on the smell. As he treated all tasks, he took this one seriously, and it was with true somberness that he applied thick brown paint over my sunny blond locks.
The silence was killing me. “Have you always preferred blondes?” I asked him.
He glanced at me in the mirror, then went back to spreading the dye. “I prefer the rainbow.”
I said with a wry smile, “That hasn’t been my color of choice for a long while.”
Unwillingly, I went back to my reflection, watching my hair turn darker, the brown setting off the blue in my eyes, the natural rouge of my cheeks that wouldn’t go away no matter how little sleep I allowed myself. His dark-haired Scottish princesses, my dad had always called us.
All I had to do was smile, see a flicker of dimple on my left cheek, and I’d be Cassie.
Theo lifted a panel of hair, his gloved hands crinkling gently in my ear. “Tell me how you learned poker so quickly. How you became so good at it during my time away.”
“As if you didn’t know,” I said, adjusting the towel around myself. “The House always knows.”
“Maybe you were a distraction,” he said. “And I wasn’t as keen as I usually claim to be.”
“I was always good at numbers,” I admitted. “By eight, my favorite subject was math. I never thought to apply it to card games, though—”
A chunk of my hair landed against my neck and shoulder with a wetthwack.“Poker is not simply acard game.”
“Which I quickly realized as soon as I started serving your patrons in lingerie,” I said. “And watched. Learned. When I met your resident dealer—”
“Fucking Kai. That narc.”
“Can I finish answering your original question?”
Theo went back to painting. “Yes. Fine. Go.”
“Kai’s tutorials, coupled with the patterns I was noticing on the felt, brought out a hidden talent. But you know all that.” I shook my head, then remembered Theo was still tugging on the strands. “Sorry. So, when you left … I don’t know, keeping up with the game, helped.”
“With what?”
I met his eyes again. “Don’t make me explain that part, Sax.”
The idea of detailing my heartache to the very man who broke it was something I never envisioned I’d do. But it was the explanation of working for the FBI I was eager to gloss over and pretend wasn’t real. Theo didn’t know the deal I made, even though he knew about Kai. Which come to think of it…
“Did you think I betrayed you? By continuing to hang out with Kai?” I asked.
Theo thought about this. “Kai and I had a close relationship, FBI or not. As evidenced by my contacting him to contain your ass when it was becoming clear you were throwing yourself into situations where you weren’t thinking first.”
“I wasfine.”
“No. You weren’t. Aren’t.”
“Which means you still care about me,” I deflected. “What made you come back, Sax? That night in the hospital … I never thought I’d see you again.”
It was as if the atoms in the air hardened, or sucked up all the oxygen, or simply popped into vivid, thick existence.
“I said I’d protect you,” Theo said, in the darkest tone I’d heard him speak. “I don’t break my promises. You’re done.”
“Huh?” Dread collected like tiny, metal magnets in my gut.
Theo settled his hands on my shoulders. “I’m finished.”
“I see.” I breathed in fresh, lightened air. “As evidenced by you staining my skin.”
Abruptly, he lifted off. “Oh. Sorry,” he said, and peeled off the gloves.
