08-19-2021, 08:27 PM
Adrian erred towards caution, an answer so non-committal and genial it almost made her laugh aloud. He claimed an ego but seemed surprisingly shy of risking offence. “If a bite is likely to do damage, you couldn’t have picked much worse company for yourself.” This time her lips did curl a brief smirk, though not precisely in mirth, and she leaned into the words like she shared the worst kept of secrets. Jay had called her out on her bad luck once. Given the common denominator for tragedy in her life (that being her own tendency for reckless decision), she couldn’t say she disagreed, even if it had been a riposte meant in jest at the time. Natalie tipped a shoulder, as if to declare it his own funeral. She wasn’t going to chase him away. Though neither would she be offended if he humbled an excuse to leave.
She’d begun to entrench herself in learning Moscow’s landscape of power, but she didn’t know anything about Adrian. Beyond the obvious, of course; Manifesto seethed with the rich, powerful, and elite, barring everyone else from the door. How loyal was he to the Custody? Most here, maybe all, were likely to be akin to Scion Marveet, ready and willing to sell flesh and soul (theirs or others) for the chance at entering the Sphere. Adrian painted an amiable picture of himself, one she chose to take at face value, but no one here was innocent.
God she was tired of this game.
Or maybe just tired. Bone-deep, soul-deep, weary.
She looked at his open hand for perhaps a heartbeat too long. In another lifetime Natalie might have taken it, trusted blind to the mercy of escape with whatever soul chose to share the journey, uncaring of the destination. The gesture now stung her with the sharpest sense of homesickness, but he was unlikely to have any idea how or why it affected her so. Still, it held her quietly a moment before her pale gaze returned to his face. A shuttered pain. She was well-practised at hiding in plain sight.
Jay had not responded to the message she’d sent upon returning to her apartment. The silence ached like a missing limb, but it wasn’t unexpected, and she would acquiesce to the space he needed to tend the cruel scars left by America and its horrors. For now she had no idea where he was, and was both too proud and too bitter to beg the Custody to unearth him as she had before. She trusted, because she had to; the bonds of loyalty that tied Jay here tied her alongside. He was the only reason she was still in Moscow, and why she would stay.
He was the reason she didn’t take Adrian’s hand.
Even absent heat, the temptation was there, and doubtless not for the reasons that polite hand was extended, though she did not think he would have said no. Self-destructive intimacy was an old bedfellow, before Africa at least, but wasn’t a path she intended tonight -- was why she wasn’t even drinking. The shift in her demeanour was small; a lilt of her head, pale-gold hair brushing a shoulder, a sly smile. A sultry self-deprecation. She drifted a few steps away before she turned, still inching backwards. He was free to follow, or not.
“Shall we see if your company is not altogether intolerable, Adrian Kane? I find myself in need of air.”
She’d begun to entrench herself in learning Moscow’s landscape of power, but she didn’t know anything about Adrian. Beyond the obvious, of course; Manifesto seethed with the rich, powerful, and elite, barring everyone else from the door. How loyal was he to the Custody? Most here, maybe all, were likely to be akin to Scion Marveet, ready and willing to sell flesh and soul (theirs or others) for the chance at entering the Sphere. Adrian painted an amiable picture of himself, one she chose to take at face value, but no one here was innocent.
God she was tired of this game.
Or maybe just tired. Bone-deep, soul-deep, weary.
She looked at his open hand for perhaps a heartbeat too long. In another lifetime Natalie might have taken it, trusted blind to the mercy of escape with whatever soul chose to share the journey, uncaring of the destination. The gesture now stung her with the sharpest sense of homesickness, but he was unlikely to have any idea how or why it affected her so. Still, it held her quietly a moment before her pale gaze returned to his face. A shuttered pain. She was well-practised at hiding in plain sight.
Jay had not responded to the message she’d sent upon returning to her apartment. The silence ached like a missing limb, but it wasn’t unexpected, and she would acquiesce to the space he needed to tend the cruel scars left by America and its horrors. For now she had no idea where he was, and was both too proud and too bitter to beg the Custody to unearth him as she had before. She trusted, because she had to; the bonds of loyalty that tied Jay here tied her alongside. He was the only reason she was still in Moscow, and why she would stay.
He was the reason she didn’t take Adrian’s hand.
Even absent heat, the temptation was there, and doubtless not for the reasons that polite hand was extended, though she did not think he would have said no. Self-destructive intimacy was an old bedfellow, before Africa at least, but wasn’t a path she intended tonight -- was why she wasn’t even drinking. The shift in her demeanour was small; a lilt of her head, pale-gold hair brushing a shoulder, a sly smile. A sultry self-deprecation. She drifted a few steps away before she turned, still inching backwards. He was free to follow, or not.
“Shall we see if your company is not altogether intolerable, Adrian Kane? I find myself in need of air.”