Page 24 of Needed in the Night
She clapped her hands. “Oh, very good, very good. Yes, that is a personal favorite.” She looked up at Mikas again and chuckled. “Big, beastly man, I will have to put you two in our largest sampling room.”
Ycari turned and half-flew, half-walked back in the direction of the rear of the shop. “Come, come,” she called over her feathered shoulder. “Come, come.”
I affected a limp once more and leaned heavily on Mikas’s arm as we followed.
“What is happening?” he asked in an undertone.
“Madame Ycari is a master perfumer,” I explained. “You don’t simply buy a pre-blended perfume from her. She gathers the ingredients and creates the perfume to match each customer’sbody chemistry. You leave with a bottle of scent that is unique to you alone, and smells precisely how you want to smell.”
“Yes,” he said patiently, still keeping his voice low. “I understand how the establishment works. But what ishappening?”
Ah. I’d wondered if—or when—he’d catch on.
“Bear with me a little longer,” I said with a smile, and limped a little extra for Scar’s benefit.
When we reached the back hallway, Ycari shooed us into the third suite on the left. This sampling room contained several very plush sofas, a counter with chairs on both sides, and very little else. The air and furniture were completely sterile and odor-free.
“I will join you soon,” Ycari said, dipping her head to me and sliding a glance at Mikas for some reason. “Perhaps…one hour?”
“Perfect,” I said with a smile.
Ycari squawked and closed the door to the hallway, leaving us alone.
I let go of Mikas’s arm, took a deep breath, and exhaled slowly to release my tension. No place could be calledsafe, but this room was the closest to it I had found on this planet, or any other I’d been on recently.
“Isla.”
I looked up. Mikas was studying me, his brow furrowed in concern rather than anger. “You believe we can speak freely in this room?” he asked.
“Yes.” I settled on the enormous sofa, took off my cross-body bag, and set it on the cushion beside me. All the furnishings were clearly designed for Fortusian customers, making me feel like a child using adult-sized furniture. “How could you tell? My body language?”
“That, and your scent.” He hesitated, then sat in a chair to my right, his back very straight—and not because he worried his spines might poke the chair cushion. He still seemed very uneasy. “Forgive me for noticing it.”
“There’s nothing to forgive.” I smiled, hoping to get him to relax a little. “I understand your senses are keener and more finely tuned than mine. It doesn’t bother me. I do try not to dwell on the fact that as a human living among Fortusians, I have a fraction of your abilities. If I did, I’d develop quite an inferiority complex.”
“Nothing about you is inferior,” he said automatically. “Your voice, least of all.”
My face warmed at the very unexpected compliment. Hopefully he didn’t think I’d been fishing for one.
“Well, thank you,” I said. “So, you’re probably wondering why I think we’re relatively safe in this room.”
“I am.” He leaned forward, his forearms on his thighs and gaze searching my face. “And why we are here. It is not to sample perfumes—or notjustto sample perfumes.”
How much should I divulge? The question had gnawed at me for at least the past month or so. My instincts told me Mikas was a good man and I could trust him at least to some extent. What those limits were, I wasn’t quite sure yet, so I couldn’t risk anyone else’s safety by revealing too much.
Maybe I could confide in him a little and give him a chance to earn more trust by inviting him to confide in me in return. My stomach churned, but I took a deep breath and took the plunge.
“If you can tell when I feel protected, or at least less on edge, then you know I’m often worried about my safety,” I said. “Without getting into any details, I’m in hiding. I came to Fortusia for a fresh start. Which you probably already guessed.”
“I did guess that.” Mikas’s tone was gentler now than I’d ever heard him be, but his brow remained furrowed. “And this shop and its owner?”
“A designated safe harbor, vouched for by people I trust completely.” I managed a small smile. “That’s as much as I can tell you other than this room is swept for listening devicesalmost hourly and nothing we say in here can be heard beyond these walls. It takes about an hour to select a perfume blend, so that’s about how much time we’ll have before our watcher becomes suspicious about what we’re doing. You have no reason to trust me, I suppose, but it’s the truth.”
“I believe you.” His frown faded. “But why did you trust me enough to reveal this?”
“Instincts,” I admitted. “Gut feeling. You’ve always been so kind to me, but more than that, I just feel…safe with you. And that’s not a feeling I get very often.”
Mikas smiled then—a real smile, the first I’d seen on his lips in all the time I’d known him. “I will accept that as the highest praise.”
