Page 56 of The Puppetmaster

“I was just wondering... you said you feel closer to the name your mother chose—”

“I said I like it better.”

I can’t suppress a sigh. “Yes. But why? Is it because you and your father don’t get along?”

He responds with an indignant huff and turns away from me.

“No one gets along with their father,” he points out. “At least not anyone I know.”

“I never really knew my father,” I interject. “He left us when my sister was still a baby and was never heard or seen again.”

Pausing for a sinister laugh, I shrug when I add, “So, yeah, I guess you could say I didn’t have the greatest relationship with that jerk, either.”

Raad looks at me with a pitiful expression, but he doesn’t seem surprised at all. He couldn’t possibly have known this about me as well?

Something touches my leg and causes me to jump up in surprise. I look down to find the cat nuzzling up to my calf. Like always, she appears on cue when I’m feeling down and in need of consolation.

“That thing really likes you,” he remarks, regarding her with a cold look.

“That thing,” I mock him. “I don’t know why you hate her so much.”

“I don’t hate her. I just don’t care much for her.”

“Then why do you let her live here?”

“Because I wanted to do my housemaid a favor. She brought it in.”

“And she never gave the cat a name, either?” Alena asks surprised, going down on her knees to pick the cat up in her arms, which the animal allows willingly. That’s yet another thing I’ve never witnessed before. Even Dorota is only allowed to pick it up when the cat feels like it.

“I never asked.”

Alena rolls her eyes at me. “Of course you didn’t.”

“I thought you wanted to come up with a name,” he says now. “It’s been a week since you got here. Can’t be that hard.”

“Well, it is,” I insist. “I want to name her something meaningful, something that fits.”

“Meaningful, huh?” he growls. “Well, what does it mean to you?”

I widen my eyes in question. “What do you mean?”

“What does the cat mean to you?” he asks again, jutting his chin forward as his eyes lay on the feline in my arms.

I squeeze her lovingly while she wriggles in my arms, signaling that she’s done with accepting my affection—but I’m not done giving it to her.

“Solace,” I admit. “She gives me comfort when I most need it, almost like we’ve been friends for a long time.”

He nods as I speak, his expression tense as he seems to ponder the question at hand.

“How about Salwa?” he suggests eventually.

“Salwa?”

“It’s an Arabic name, and it means exactly that: solace.”

“Salwa,” I repeat the name again, looking into the cat’s blue eyes, as if asking her whether she likes that name. It doesn’t matter in the end because I like it. I love it, actually.

But I’m too stubborn to let him know that.

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