Page 55 of Elven Crown

“What do you think you’re doing down here?”

Rowan’s gaze flashed toward the shifter. When his grin widened, Rebecca wondered how much longer these two could play at trying to one-up each other before something terrible happened.

“Well, you did say there would be a briefing in the armory, didn’t you? Granted, it was a little difficult to find my way down here. This place is incredibly complicated to navigate, but I’m learning my way around.”

“No one gave you orders to sit in on this briefing,” Maxwell snapped.

“Oh, I’m sorry. I didn’t know it was that kind of a thing. Everybody just seems so…open here.” Rowan inhaled deeply through his nose, as if taking in the scent of budding wildflowers on a fresh breeze, then turned toward Rebecca and pointed at her. “I came forher, actually. I was hoping I might get in a word or two with you before you leave.”

How much more of a pain in her ass could he possibly be?

Rebecca already knew the answer to that, and it was quite a bit more than what he’d demonstrated already. She preferred to keep that from happening for as long as possible.

“I told you,” Maxwell started again, “you don’t get to make requests.”

“Will a word or two keep you from stalking me through headquarters?” Rebecca blurted, fixing Rowan with a deadpan stare.

Beside their vehicle in the garage, a few members of her small team snickered but didn’t stop loading the rest of their things into the back.

She could feel Maxwell’s scowl on the side of her face now, but she wouldn’t acknowledge it. She didn’t have to.

Rowan chuckled and spread his arms. “Maybe, yeah. Depends on how the first few words go.”

Rolling her eyes, Rebecca motioned for the rest of the team to keep loading up before lowering her voice at Maxwell. “This won’t be long.”

He said nothing, but she felt his gaze on her still as she stepped a few feet away for the illusion of privacy so she and Rowan could get through these first few words of his before she shut him down and moved on.

When she stopped and turned toward him, he opened his mouth to start speaking, but she didn’t give him the chance.

“Listen, Blackmoon,” she said, ignoring the way his smile twitched whenever she called him by his last name in front of everyone else. So far, that had been every single time she’d addressed him. “This is our job. You’re part of Shade now. It’syourjob, too.

“So when I say I’m busy or there’s other stuff going on, you’re just gonna have to accept the fact that a private conversation onyourtime isn’t my top priority. Whatever it is you think we need to talk about, you need to table it for later, specifically when Isay so. Right now, this task force has a lot bigger issues on our hands. Got it?”

The whole time she delivered her curt little speech, barely restraining the full force of her frustration, that tingling warmth washing over her like a blanket and pulling her away from her focus grew stronger and stronger by the second, splitting her concentration.

It didn’t matter anymorehowshe knew. She just knew Maxwell had been slowly making his way toward her while she spoke, as if he were preparing for Rowan to attack her or try something dangerous and reckless no one in their right mind would have ever attempted.

She forced herself to keep pretending she couldn’t feel anything and didn’t know exactly where he was in the room at any time.

The fact that Rowan didn’t immediately offer some mocking rebuttal founded on pure nonsense immediately concerned her.

Rebecca watched him study her face, though, and couldn’t help but feel like he was finally seeing her for the first time. More than when she’d stumbled in on him in the holding room the night he’d infiltrated the compound. More than during The Striving or any other time she’d felt him watching her anywhere else.

Rowan’s entire demeanor changed just like that. His smile disappeared. His brightly glistening eyes—usually so full of energy and laughter, including at the most inappropriate times—dimmed and narrowed.

He dipped his head toward her, frowning now at whatever new discovery he’d just made and clearly didn’t like.

“Holy shit,” he murmured. “You’re actuallyseriousabout all this, aren’t you?”

Took him long enough.

She would have loved to lay into him for having thought she’d been screwing around this whole time, but they weren’t alone. Fortunately, that was what she’d wanted.

“Everyone here,” she told him, “everyone who passed through The Striving and swore their oath, is serious about Shade and about what we do. You’re right. Youareone of us, and I expect you to start acting like it.”

With nothing else to say and no reason to give him any more airtime, she spun smartly around, already knowing she would find Maxwell there behind her.

For someone who had snuck up on her, he looked incredibly surprised to be addressed next.

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