Page 167 of The Sin Binder's Vow

He swears under his breath, gripping the wheel with the kind of manic focus reserved for ancient rituals and bombdiffusal. “Okay, that wasn’t me,” he mutters. “That was the road. Probably cursed.”

“Pretty sure that was the clutch,” Elias offers from the middle seat, wedged between Ambrose and me like a sacrificial lamb. “Or the fact that you drive like the ghost of someone whothinksthey had a license once.”

Silas narrows his eyes. “I resent that.”

“You resenteverything,” Elias says. “Especially pedestrians.”

The car sputters again as Silas shifts—wrong, clearly—grinding the gears like he’s punishing them for existing. Then it stalls.

Dead.

Right in the middle of a bend in the road with the trees arching overhead like judgmental priests.

There’s a beat of silence.

Then Luna sighs. Thelongkind, like she’s been patient for exactly one minute longer than she should’ve been.

“Silas,” she says calmly, with only a trace of murder, “get out.”

He looks scandalized. “You don’t trust me?”

“Itrustedyou,” she says, unbuckling. “Now I want to get to the theater without dying or being possessed by the spirit of bad driving.”

“She has a point,” Ambrose adds, adjusting his cuff like the entire evening has already disappointed him.

Silas groans but gets out.

And Luna slides behind the wheel. She doesn’t say anything when she starts the car. Doesn’t flex. Doesn’t show off.

She justdrives.

Clean. Smooth. Shift like silk. She handles the stick with the kind of precision that would make priests weep and monsters beg.

It takes three seconds.

Three seconds before Elias breaks.

“Okay,” he says slowly, watching her hand move on the gearshift, “not to be that guy, but... you’re really good with a stick.”

Luna doesn’t look at him. “Don’t.”

“Too late,” Elias continues, grinning like a drunk gremlin. “The way you handled that clutch? I think I just developed a kink I didn’t know I had.”

“Downshifted straight into my heart,” Silas mourns from beside her, dramatically pressing a hand to his chest. “And you didn’t even grind once. Rude.”

Ambrose doesn’t say anything, but helooksat her—and it’s worse. That slow, glinting stare like he’s memorizing the curve of her wrist and what she could do if she applied that same technique somewhereelse.

Luna arches a brow but keeps her eyes on the road. “You’re all children.”

“Hot, traumatized children,” Elias says.

“I’m driving. I could crash this thing.”

“Do it,” Silas says from behind me. “Make it look like an accident. I’d die for your downshifting.”

She flicks the turn signal on with a perfectly timed little click. Doesn’t flinch. Doesn’t smile.

But I see it—the smallest twitch at the corner of her mouth.

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