Page 66 of Obsidian Prince

Liliana giggled again as she searched through Alexander’s closet. She’d fallen asleep in her ballet slippers, but that was the only thing she was currently wearing.

John pushed some of the chunks of broken blender aside with his boot. He lifted a scrap of torn cloth off the barstool he was about to sit on. His face made some weird contortions as he struggled not to smile. Holding up the torn scrap that used to be Alexander’s t-shirt, he looked at his commanding officer with a poorly suppressed smirk and raised eyebrows. “Something you want to tell me, sir?”

Alexander looked at him, face blank and serious. “No, there isn’t.”

John shrugged and tossed the scrap of material behind him to land on the couch. He glanced at the dress and bra. “Was she anyone I know?”

“Would you like to spend the rest of your tour as a gate guard?”

John winced. “Fine, so we bring in Pete. I don’t see how you’re going to avoid letting him know what you are.”

Alexander nodded. “I’ve been advised that I should come clean with Pete about my nature.”

“Didn’t that Eliot guy tell you it was a super bad idea because of the whole Celtic wolf unseelie thing? Possibly, a battle to the death level of bad?”

“I’ve gotten new advice that I trust more than I trusted Eliot’s advice.”

Liliana bounced on her toes a little, her grin broad enough to crack her face in half as she chose something to wear. She didn’t think anything of Alexander’s in camo would be appropriate since she wasn’t a soldier, and they all looked like mud and algae anyway.

“You finally got together with Liliana,” John said with a knowing smirk.

Alexander narrowed his eyes. “Why do you say that?”

Liliana figured now was as good a time as any to come out since apparently John already knew she was there.

As he glanced toward her, his smile broadened. “Lucky guess.”

She walked in front of the kitchen island, behind John’s barstool. Along with her new black ballet slippers with the long ribbons that wrapped up to her knees, she wore one of Alexander’s white dress shirts that fell down to her knees to meet the ribbons.

Normally she would be uncomfortable wearing so little in front of two men, but in her current state of mind, she couldn’t be bothered to care.

“Good morning, John.” She carefully avoided the chunky bits of machinery and broken glass on the floor from the blender so she could sit down on the barstool next to him.

“So you really don’t care what the Colonel thinks of you, I see. Not at all.”

Liliana lifted one finger without looking at him in a gesture that had served her well for decades on this continent.

John lost his battle to hold in his laughter.

Ignoring him, Alexander asked her, “Would you like some tea?”

“But you don’t drink tea,” Liliana said, confused. “You had none the last time I visited you.”

Alexander opened the cupboard above and to the right of his sink. The entire bottom shelf was filled with little square tins of many kinds of loose-leaf teas, each with what looked like an ink stamp on the beige labels of a woman in a Victorian dress merged with a gear where her legs should be. Tea Punk Teas.

Liliana couldn’t decide which amazing flavor to choose. Some were familiar flavors like jasmine green and masala chai and something called Earl Grey De La Crème. Oh, that sounds delicious. Others were completely new.

She chose the one that seemed most appropriately named for her current situation. “Elixir D’Amour.”

Alexander’s mouth made that pleased little twitch at the corners that she loved. This morning, his understated smile was less subtle than usual.

John buried his own smile behind his cup of coffee.

* * *

Later that morning, after Alexander had given her a quick lift to her house to put on proper clothes, they drove out to the forest near Bones Creek where the murders had taken place.

By the time Liliana and Alexander arrived, John had already gathered several people. The lovely campsite with the trickling stream on one side, a huge, centuries-old cypress with what looked like a lightning scar providing shade, and a stunning view of the surrounding hillsides had been stained a few days ago with the blood of a pair of soldiers, two friends who camped there on their day off.

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