Page 46 of Our Radiant Embers

That was fair.

I waved a hand. “Do go on.”

“Too kind, oh brother dearest.” It held a gentle note of mockery, his tone fond. “As I was saying, I don’t need details. But you and Liam? How did that happen?”

I walked him through the Cliff Notes version of it, finishing just as we pulled into the Morgans’ road. “Cat got your tongue?” I asked when several seconds of silence followed my explanation.

“Just thinking.”

“Don’t make it a habit.”

“Only on Mondays when the moon is full.” He pulled to a halt in front of the Morgans’ gate. Fortunately, their defence didn’t rely solely on the thick iron bars that I could have melted in seconds—I’d glimpsed several technical enhancements around the compound the other times I’d been here, although I didn’t know what purpose most of them served. Maybe that was the point.

“So,” Gale said just as the gate slid open for us. “Do you like him?”

“What are we—twelve?” I turned my attention to the cameras mounted on both sides of the gate, a drone docked next to one of them. It rose as our car began moving again, tracking us.

“Fine.” Gale shot me an amused look. “Do you only want to fuck his brains out? Or do you want to talk for hours, kiss and hold hands and make sweet love in a bathtub while sipping red wine?”

“Is this how you picture gay relationships? Because if so, wow.”

“Stop deflecting.”

“But it doesn’t matter, does it? Even if I did ‘like him’,”—I inserted air quotes—“and even if it was mutual, which I doubt…”

“Why?” Gale asked. We parked in front of the house while the gate shut behind us, locking us in.

“Because we didn’t exactly gel with each other at the beginning of this collaboration. I even pulled the sand bottle trick on him.”

Gale shot me a brief grin, tinged with a trace of sadness. “And was he impressed?”

“Yeah.” I let my mouth twitch into a smile. “But he hid it well.”

“I kind of like this guy.” Rather than get out of the car, Gale fixed me with a direct look. “Okay, fine. You started off on the wrong foot. But you got over it, he probably did too, and you already hooked up. Plus you offered our help in building his office.”

“So they’ll owe us,” I said quickly.

He scoffed. “Maybe Dad and Eleanor bought that line, but I don’t. You wanted him to like you.”

I squashed the impulse to bristle like a hedgehog in full defence mode. “Bribing people into liking me is not my style.”

Gale sighed. “You know that’s not how I meant it.”

He got it. Of course he did—sometimes I forgot that just like me, he’d been befriended by people who expected benefits. We’d both learned to spot them.

“Then how did you mean it?” I asked, more quietly. The drone was hovering above the hood of the car, peering at us through the windshield.

“You’re new to flirting—or even liking anyone, for that matter.” Gale grinned at me, wide and sweet. “You’re out of your depth.”

“You and Cassandra should get together sometime, paint your nails while you gossip about my love life.”

“What love life?” Gale’s tone was light. I was about to tell him I was in a committed relationship with zero drama, which could not be said about his last girlfriend, when Liam walked out of the house to meet us. He waved a hand at the drone, raising his voice so it carried through to us.

“Don’t worry, she’s friendly.”

I nudged my door open while Gale asked, “Did he just refer to the drone like it’s a dog?”

“Did you just refer to your drone like it’s a dog?” I passed on to Liam as I got out. The drone did one loop around my head and then zoomed over to Gale’s side of the car.

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