Page 68 of A Liar's Twisted Tongue

“Your laugh,” he says. “It’s bewitching.”

Now he’s looking at me in a way that scares me and I feel suddenly sober.

I’ve never been called bewitching. My laugh or otherwise. And the way he continues to look at me tells me he meant it. Staring as if there’s something worthy of awe somewhere in my face. Maybe right now there is, with all of Aralia’s glamour.

But while I look at him, I suddenly wish he was looking at me.

So I skip away, my hands shaking with nervousness I’d rather shake away—or drink away. I grab my glass of wine and run right into him. Red soaks his suit and he laughs.

But I’m petrified. Shocked! Stunned! Mortified! Feeling a little goofy too, because I’ve just ruined what must be the most expensive piece of clothing I’ve seen in my life, but he just looks at me.

His face is nothing but a picture of insouciance. It’s infectious, the way he is looking and acting. His usually perfect hair is messed up, dark inky waves moving in every direction and into his eyes. I like the thought that I am the one who rumpled the perfect prince.

That I have the power and position to do such a thing.

I push him into one of the dusty chairs, a little too harshly I think. He looks at me with recognizable amusement filling his eyes. “What are we doing now?”

I grab the school’s uniform coat I’d been wearing before I put on the ridiculously beautiful green-and-gold dress. Then I start unbuttoning his—soft—royal blue coat. Gods, what material is this? I want to wear it to sleep.

“Darling if you wanted to undress me there are far easier ways to go about it than spilling wine.” He leans back in the chair.

I hit his chest with the back of my hand, a sloppy, droozen gesture. Something that I hope distracts from the blood rushing to my cheeks. “I’m cleaning you.”

“Ah. You didn’t have to spill wine to do that either,” he says with a lazy shrug.

“What?” I ask, laughing again. He laughs too, and my head falls on his shoulder from the force of it! Have I said how much I love laughing?

“There are far more satisfying ways to get dirty, but if they all end with you cleaning me like this…” Lucian looks at my hands, both of them on him, neither of them cleaning. Not when half of me has fallen over on him laughing! Not that I care that much either. “Then I could get used to the wine.”

“You talk like someone who’s touch-deprived,” I say.

“Well I don’t think I could ever get enough of you.”

“You mean my…” I push my hands up his chest. “Glorious, glorious hands?”

Lucian smiles and a laugh fills the room once again. “Yes, Marquees, I could never get enough of your glorious, glorious hands.”

I push myself back up and look at my glorious hands, feigning adoration.

When I look at him, I find him smiling at me. The room is still spinning, but a little less so that I can see… “Hold still,” I say, reaching out my hand. “You have wine on your chin.”

Lucian’s head falls back with laughter before my thumb can make contact.

“What?” I ask breathlessly.

He straightens his head and looks at me, his lips pursed. Then he takes the back of his hand and smears across his chin and lips.

“Better?” he asks.

“Perfect,” I laugh.

“I know.” He shrugs, leaning back in his chair. But his eyes don’t leave mine for even a second.

“It’s still there,” I find myself whispering so quietly I doubt he heard me. “It looks like blood on your lips.”

“And why are you looking at my lips?” he asks with his eyes on my lips.

“Because it messes them up.”

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