She laughed and gave a slight eye roll as Cookie Jar broke from Lenny and said, “Please excuse us,” before piloting Ketija away.
Halsey’s smile fell fifty-two stories and splattered on the sidewalk when he looked at Lenny and took in the rigidity of her posture. “What happened?” He’d had half an ear on her conversation with Cookie Jar, but he’d missed what had upset her, unless what had upset her happened before her private confab with the prime minister.
“I need a drink,” she said, marching past him.
He turned to follow and found Baiba Jansons waiting for him. “Mr. Sherwood. How nice to see you again. I see you met our esteemed prime minister.” She opened her arms wide. She wore a kaftan that sparkled, and if he wasn’t mistaken, it was trimmed in emerald-colored jewels. “Do I not look resplendent?”
“You do indeed.”
“Do I dare hope you are big bear baiting at this little event?”
He patted his pockets. “Readying my traps.” He had hope she was readying hers.
She touched his shoulder as she passed with an enigmatic smile he found encouraging, and he went in search of Lenny, finding her chatting with people he had no reason to interrupt. Though he wanted to. Wanted to take her hand again and see if that’s what had upset her. He stood off to the side and waited, and when she rejoined him, she stood apart and faced away.
“Who was the woman in the kaftan?” Lenny had a champagne glass in one hand and her other was wrapped around her waist, a definite don’t-touch-me move that went with her skipping-all-over-the-room eye contact.
“The future prime minister of Ossovia.”
Lenny handed her glass to a passing waiter. “You stand there, barely able to make small talk, and yet you plan to topple a government. It’s like buttons under cups to you, and yet it’s absolutely terrifying.”
Not as easy as a sleight of hand. His side of the con was planned meticulously, and it wasn’t guaranteed to work, except that greed and ego were the easiest of all failings to target, and Cookie Jar had those attributes by the container load. “Lenny, I—”
She shook her head. “I don’t know what I’m doing here.” She broke away, making for the exit.
She should’ve been triumphant—contact made, the first step in their plan faultlessly executed.
She didn’t wait to see if he trailed her. She moved like it was midnight and her shoes might turn into leg irons and prevent her from escaping. When she veered into a corridor right before taking the entrance doorway, he caught up with her.
“You’re upset.” It was a dangerous statement. They were alone, far enough from the party he could no longer hear the zither and the fiddles, but this wasn’t the ideal place to have an argument.
She flung a hand out, gesturing to the partygoers outside. “Are you sure about him?”
“Why are you asking?”
“Because he is impeccable. Beautiful manners, the way he made me feel like I was important to him and to the Heroes League. That the work I’m doing is valuable. I just. I can’t.” Lenny put the heel of her hand to her forehead and bounced it twice. “I can’t take it in. I wanted him to look like a monster, and he looks like a movie star. I wanted him to give me some sign he was a terrible person. I wanted my skin to crawl and my spidey sense of evil to zing, but I felt nothing like that.” She dropped her hand, and her anguished expression told him what her words didn’t. “Is there any chance you’re wrong about him?”
What he shouldn’t have felt was relief. The kind that imprinted on you when your big brother let you out of the garden shed after you thought you might be stuck in there for the rest of your young life. She wasn’t upset because he’d touched her; she was meeting her father’s deceit all over again in Cookie Jar and in Halsey.
“It’s why he’s successful at being a tyrant. It’s why he’s survived politically.”
She looked away. “I hate him so much.”
He couldn’t think of a response that would make her feel better. He wanted to reach for her hand, and if she let their fingers twine, to draw her into his arms and try to ease away the sting of discovery, but there was half a corridor and an agreement to be partners only in this one endeavor between them.
And his promise to keep her safe, if only from himself.
“And you”—she gave him a scalding look that raised the fine hairs all over his body—“you can’t even fake boyfriend properly.” She took a step toward him. “You kissed me here.” She tapped her temple. “Was it an accident? Just for show? You could barely look at me tonight, and then suddenly you want my hand, you want to kiss me.”
He closed some of the distance between them. Another ill-advised move. He was full of them tonight. “I wanted to tell you how beautiful you are. Not just tonight. I wanted to tell you that I think you’re wonderful. Strong and passionate and resilient and brave, but the way you look tonight, you turned my tongue into leather, and I couldn’t form the words.”
She made a hah, sound, disbelief and hurt.
“If this whole thing is too much for you—”
She closed the rest of the distance between them, poking him hard in the chest with her finger. “I want that bastard reduced to dust. And if you want to kiss me, you should be a man and do it like it means something, not like it’s acting.”
It wouldn’t be acting, and he definitely shouldn’t do it while she was angry. “Lenny, are you telling me you want me to kiss you, even though I’m a con and you despise the ground I walk on?” She was taller in those fairy-tale shoes; she was brighter and more present and more wanted than anything in his life. “Because if it’s something you need, me kissing you, then—”