“No.” Lila had no desire for the lilac-robed woman to mess with her mind again. The oracle had an entire compound full of private militia. She and her purplecoats could deal with whatever crisis had come upon them.
They could reap the nightmares that followed.
Damn the gods and damn the oracles. Lila didn’t even know what she believed about them anymore, and she had grown tired of thinking about the question and its implications.
“I’ve seen her name on your palm nearly every day,” Tristan pressed. “She’s even started calling me now.”
“So block her ID.”
“She wants to see you. I think she wants to help.”
“I don’t need her help.” Lila stood and slipped into Tristan’s shirt from the night before.
“Maybe you do. Maybe you should consider it.”
“When she has one of her so-called visions about Reaper’s partner, then I’ll consider it. That’s the only useful thing she can offer me right now.”
“I don’t think that’s the kind of help she’s offering.”
“I told you. I don’t need help, not from her.”
“Lila—”
“I need a shower.”
Lila turned to go. The bed creaked. Tristan grabbed her arm once more. “If you don’t want that kind of help, fine. But if something happens at breakfast, if your mother tries anything, I want you to go to the oracle’s compound. I don’t care if you’re an outsider. That woman owes you. She owes both of us.”
Lila slipped from his grasp. “My mother won’t send her blood squad after me, Tristan. I didn’t mess up that badly.”
She left the bedroom, easing into the dark apartment beyond before sliding into the bathroom and switching on the light. The sudden, apathetic brightness burned her eyes, and the tile chilled the soles of her feet. She closed the door with a quick little snick, careful not to wake Dixon in the room next door. She strode quickly to the shower and turned on the water. A loud growl thundered down the pipes, then faded as the plumbing shuddered to life.
As the water rushed and warmed, Lila bent over the cracked sink and stared at her image in the mirror. Her vacation had taken away the dark circles under her eyes, but her dreams had left their mark upon them. They’d grown darker, grown harder, grown…
Different.
She turned away from the mirror and ran her fingers through her curls. Stepping into the shower, she warmed herself underneath the water and reached for her shampoo, perched beside Tristan’s as if it had lived there all along.
As if she had lived there all along.
A month ago, she wouldn’t have believed that a bottle of shampoo could freak her out so completely. But highborns didn’t live with one another, and they never focused on one lover.
Being with Tristan in the shop?
Only the poorer classes did such things.
At some point, she’d stopped caring, only understanding that she didn’t want to slip into anyone else’s bed. Tristan had gotten under her skin, and she didn’t know what to do about it. Maybe she didn’t even want to do anything about it. It didn’t help that she’d enjoyed every minute of her time with Tristan, at least when she wasn’t panicking. Panicking about him, her blackmailer, the eventual loss of her job and place among the highborn, about everything she’d worked for her entire life turning to shit.
She stepped out of the shower and blew her hair dry quickly. Then she returned to Tristan’s room, dropping her damp towel before his watchful eyes. She pulled on a pair of scratchy black trousers, a long-sleeved gray t-shirt, and a black sweater—servant’s clothes, for colors weren’t allowed among the workborn unless you had a contract with a highborn family. A pair of cheap, worn boots completed the look. She tucked her boot knife into a sheath near her calf.
She shoved her mesh hood in her front pocket, something she’d need as soon as she stepped outside the apartment, for few of Tristan’s people knew her face or her identity. So far they’d stayed quiet, but Lila didn’t want to risk any more of them finding out.
Just another risk. Just one more thing that could result in exile.
She stared at her canvas bag in the corner of Tristan’s bedroom, filled with a few other similar outfits and toiletries. She wondered if she should even bother taking it along.
Where would she go after her mother kicked her out?
Would she flee to Burgundy like so many exiled highborns, just in case her blackmailer leaked her story? The country refused extradition orders. She’d be safe there. Then again, perhaps she’d stay in New Bristol, continuing this thing with Tristan until it eventually faded, staying until her blackmailer got her arrested.