Unfortunately, the coffee she drank hadn’t kept her awake. She woke up with her nose pressed into her keyboard, a long string of slashes and semicolons upon the screen.
She’d still had a few keyboard marks on her face after dressing for the day.
Pax’s eyes bounced back and forth among Lila and her parents. He scratched his chin and picked up his knife and fork, cutting a bite of his omelet, the knife squealing as it raked across the china.
“About your car,” her father began.
Lila sighed. She didn’t have the time or the desire to buy a new car today, something she’d do as soon as he tried to bar her from the garage.
“I thought about taking your keys away. I’d be within my rights to do so. You’re going to kill yourself one of these days.”
He placed his fork on the table. “For oracle’s sake, Lila, you had a wreck less than two weeks ago. You’d think those stitches all over your hands would remind you to slow down. I have no desire to claim your body when half of it is still smeared on the road. Unfortunately, you’re an adult.”
“I’m more than an adult. I’m—”
“Don’t push me, Elizabeth. You might be the chief of a family, but I’m the prime minister of an entire country. I have an entire army at my disposal. I could have you locked in this compound for the next ten years if I wished.”
Lila raised a brow.
“But you’d just find a way to wiggle out of it. Oracle’s light, child. Stop being stupid. Whatever’s crawled up your ass, find a different way of dealing with it.”
The chairwoman turned her head. “Language, Henri.”
“Bea? Sometimes you make me want to borrow Lila’s Firefly.”
Pax chuckled as their mother turned her face away, harrumphing.
At least Lila’s mother said nothing for the rest of the meal, likely plotting a way to make her father pay for the remark.
He would pay eventually. So would Lila for her cheek lately, and for the Blanc.
They wouldn’t pay today, though. Her mother let the bulk of Lila’s attitude pass unchecked, probably because Peter had nearly killed her less than a week before. But the temporary reprieve would soon fade, and her mother would be back to her usual mood and consequences, plotting and scheming.
Lila finished her meal and left the table, pausing at the door while she slipped on her blackcoat, gritting her teeth as the leather pulled on her shoulder. She’d run the obstacle course before breakfast and had taken a particularly nasty fall.
Winding a scarf around her neck, she stepped onto the gravel path.
Her father followed her outside. “Is it the oracles?”
“Is what the oracles?”
“Is that the thing making you so…”
“Would you care if it was?” she asked, thrusting her hands in her pockets.
“Of course I would care. You’ve always been capable of handling so much. Even when you were a kid.”
“So what, now I’m weak because I got a speeding ticket?”
“No, you’re just acting like a pain in the ass.” He untied and retied his scarf, clearly uncomfortable. “Lila, the staff has informed me that you haven’t… That it’s been a very long time since…”
“Since what?”
Her father fixed her with a stare. “You’re to take a lover this season. That’s not an order or a demand, obviously. You’re too old for those. It’s just a sincere wish on behalf of me and your mother. In the meantime, we’ve spoken with Commander Sutton and cleared you for two weeks’ vacation. You don’t have to go to St. Kitts, but take this time to… Well, I’m sure you have an old lover somewhere or a senator you fancy. Rent a hotel room some place beautiful and stay there.”
Lila’s jaw dropped. “Excuse me?”
“I’ve worked you too hard lately. What with our work and the council and your job as chief, you haven’t had time to get out lately. You’re twenty-eight years old, in the prime of your life, and you have no lovers. I blame myself.”