He made his opening move, followed by mine. As he considered his next one, he ran the pad of his thumb over his fingertips.
My chess games with him weren’t just the pieces on the board, it was everything we did and said, and I wanted to distract. My gaze flicked the Alice. “Is she not allowed to talk? Or move?”
He made his move. “No, she’s not.”
I picked up my knight and set it down in its required L-shaped move. “Why?”
He slid his bishop diagonally a few spaces. “Because when I found you on the stairs, she made everything stop for me. I think she should experience what that’s like.”
I couldn’t rein in the gasp. His words punched it clean from my lungs.
He lifted his piercing gaze from the board to meet mine, his words heavy with subtext. “It’s your move.”
I tried to swallow, but my mouth had gone completely dry. I sat up straighter in my chair and peered down at the board, but it was hard to concentrate. His words continued to ring in my ears. I’d wanted to distract him, but he’d just given me a master class.
My voice was meeker than I wanted it to be. “How long does she have to stay like that?”
He tilted his head to the side, considering, and once the decision was made, he directed the statement at his wife. “You may move any time Marist is touching a chess piece.”
Alice’s hopeful gaze turned to the board, and when I set my fingertips on my queen, she came to life. Her shoulders relaxed and a hand flew up to rub the tip of her nose, satisfying an itch she hadn’t been allowed to scratch.
I moved my queen into play, and the second my fingers came off her, Alice solidified, returning to her statue state. Darkness inside me wanted to grin at what Macalister had done, how he’d given me control over her. I liked the taste of power.
We continued to play, and I enjoyed deciding how long I would let her have freedom. It made her so dependent on me, and it was a sweet role reversal.
“I’ve missed this,” he said as he captured my bishop. It wasn’t clear if he meant playing against me, or defeating me, because he was currently doing both.
“I haven’t.”
His lips twitched like they wanted to smile, but he wouldn’t allow it. “You’re right, you’re not a very good liar.”
My eyes burned at him, and I clenched my jaw. Did I miss the strategy of the game? Maybe a little. But not him as a partner. The only reason I didn’t play it on my phone anymore was because I didn’t like how fast the program made its move. There wasn’t any body language to learn or read.
It was only a few more moves before we entered the endgame.
“Check,” he said. “I appreciate what you were trying to do over here,” he motioned toward the trap I’d laid in an attempt to capture his queen, “but I saw right through it.”
The game was already lost, but the cruel thing about chess was you had to keep playing until the end.
“Checkmate.” Macalister leaned back in his chair and put his arms on the armrests, satisfaction streaking through his expression. “Thank you for the game.”
I stared glumly at the board, waiting for him to either begin or give Alice his approval to start, and although I wasn’t looking at him, I sensed his irritation when I didn’t respond the way he would have liked me to.
The leather of his chair creaked as he stood. “To reiterate the terms, if you leave before we’re through, the deal’s off.”
I glared up at him. “I understand.”
“Good.”
He extended a hand toward his wife, which she took, and he pulled her to her feet. She stood beside him, waiting for his direction like she was a lowly soldier under his command. And he looked back at her as a general who found her lacking.
“What you did,” he said to her, “nearly cost me everything. My disappointment in you is . . . immeasurable.”
Alice blinked, and her chest moved faster as her breathing quickened. Her throat bobbed in a nervous swallow. “I’m sorry.”
As she grew more human, it was the opposite for him. He was cold and indifferent. “I don’t believe you are.”
“No, but I am.” She glanced at me with watery eyes. “I’m sorry, Marist. I wasn’t trying to kill you, I—”
He angrily snapped his fingers in front of her, drawing her attention back to him. “No, we haven’t gotten to that part yet. Your first apology will be to me.”
Her shoulders pulled back, and confusion splashed on her face. The thoughts running through her head were loud and clear. She thought she’d already apologized to him and she wasn’t sure why she had to do it again.