Page 42 of Iron Cross

“Is that some kind of art reference?” he asked, his nose scrunched in irritation.

“No, Blink,” I said, with a long, aggrieved sigh. “Not everything is about art—”

“It is with you,” he grumbled.

“— and in this case, it’s a literary reference. A story popularized by Washington Irving. Ever heard of him?”

“For fuck’s sake,” he said with a roll of his eyes. “I’ve studied literature in four different languages and English was not one of them.”

“Well, that’s your fault.”

“Well, that’s your fault,” he mocked, his face so serious that it made me burst out laughing.

He didn’t quite laugh, but he did smile.

“How’s the search for my replacement?” I asked, bitterness creeping in again.

My only friend couldn't help but betray me. That was the sad truth of it. We had a job to do, after all, and I couldn’t do mine.

“The search for your augmentation,” he said, his jaw clenched, “Is going…” He let out a long sigh. “It’s going. That’s all I can say about it.”

“That well, huh?”

I had realized who he would need to reach out to - who he had to curry favor with to replace the income I was losing the company. I almost felt bad for him. Almost.

“She still hates me,” he said, without needing to elaborate more.

“I hate you too,” I said.

“Well, that doesn’t matter as much to me,” he said with a smile he tried to hide.

Ever the stoic Lithuanian, even a smile was too much emotion for him.

“Please, Picasso,” he said quietly. “I need to know you hear me. I need to know you’re listening.”

He tipped his chin up and rested his overburdened head against the headrest.

“I worry about you, Kira,” he said, using my name to emphasize his point. That he saw me as a person. That he sawme.“Please, I cannot be distracted right now with fear and guilt that I have brought this mayhem on to you.”

My brows furrowed, as I looked at him - really looked at him.

Blink’s curse was his talent for observation. He could read a room, he could read people, he could see the details that painted a picture that most of us would miss. A talent I had admired. He had made a study of microexpressions, and could get just as much information from a conversation from what wasn’t said, as the words exchanged.

I tried to use those skills that he’d taught me now.

His eyes were heavy. There were dark circles under that weren’t normally there. His entire face looked like it was dragged downward. Had he been sleeping?

“I cannot tolerate your misery on my conscience.”

Was that what made him act this way?

To my complete surprise, he reached over the center console and took my hand in his. When he turned his face towards me, I was struck with the raw emotion there.

“I don’t have a lot of friends, darling,” he said. His deep voice felt hollow, as though every word fatigued him. “And I don’t even know if the feeling of friendship is mutual. But I am closer to you than I am to anyone except…”

He cut himself off, shaking his head.

“Please, do me this kindness and just tell me what rule number one is.”

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