3. Liam

The Harringtons were richer than political promises during an election year. Big fucking surprise.

Presumably, they'd invited me into their pretentious abode to illustrate just that. And yes, in all honesty, the towering columns, turrets, and manicured lawns looked impressive, as did the stern-faced guards at the entrance of the estate. Taking a leaf out of the King's Guard's handbook, were we?

My Audi looked rather out of place. As did I—although I'd made a deliberate choice, opting for jeans, trainers, and a leather jacket.

When the heavy front door swung open, I draped myself in measured indifference. A butler, his formal uniform as crisp as his expression, scrutinised my general being and surely found me unworthy of the opulence that surrounded us. Like I cared.

After confirming my identity, he led me through a vast entrance hall with a gleaming chessboard floor—someone sure liked their marble. In the stillness, our steps echoed, mine faintly more muffled than the butler's click-clacking dress shoes. The floral scent of cleaning products hung in the air.

We proceeded along a hallway, closed doors on either side, until we arrived in front of an office. The butler rapped his knuckles on the doorframe. Behind a massive desk about the size of my bedroom, Adam looked up with a smile as polished as the marble floors. His gaze travelled down my body and back up.

"I see you put some effort into choosing a professional attire."

Ah, yes—skip all pretence and jump right into trading barbs. Lovely.

Projecting mild disinterest, I took in the room before I returned my attention to Adam and his white button-up. Admittedly, it fit him well. Since I wasn't three beers in, it didn't affect me.

"I believe in substance over style." I sauntered past the butler and right up to a bookshelf that held a variety of old, leather-bound tomes. Rumours equipped the Harringtons with one of the biggest collections of books on the history, theory, and application of magic, but of course they wouldn't exhibit those quite as overtly. Shame. Average as my magic potential was, I'd been trying to solidify my knowledge. The books that were widely available hadn't quenched my need for answers.

What were the conditions for magic to thrive? How could I reliably harmonise the flow when using two or more types of magic for one device? Why did my family stand as an anomaly, five of us secretly harbouring subdued potential for all four elements when the norm was one? Granted, a small number of powerful mages possessed a weaker gift for a secondary element—without exception, it was the opposite of their primary strength, often kept concealed as an ace up their sleeves. Adam, for instance, was the strongest fire mage I'd met, while his water ability registered only at Blaze-level.

"I can see that," Adam said dryly, rising from behind the desk. "Can I offer you some coffee or tea?"

I turned. "A shot of vodka might make this bearable."

It was barely out when I remembered why that was a terrible idea. The brief tightening of Adam's mouth said that he did, too. "Get us a bottle of sparkling water, please," he told the butler. "And a coffee for me. Nothing for my guest, it seems."

"Right away, sir." The butler turned on his heel and disappeared back the way we'd come.

"You said ‘please'." I draped my leather jacket over the armrest of an antique sofa. "I'm impressed."

Adam's forehead creased, pretty hazel eyes clouding over. Aesthetically, I couldn't fault my drunken choices. "I wasn't raised by wolves," he said.

"Obviously." I waved at our general surroundings before I stepped around him to look more closely at the Harrington model which sat on the desk. A week ago, I hadn't studied its details because I'd been too focused on my own pitch. But now, miraculously, my family was in on this adventure—Christ, I still couldn't quite believe it. The Green Horizon Initiative was sixteen sizes too big for us. I could only imagine the feathers it had ruffled in this house.

Golden feathers. The kind that would make peacocks look like mere peasants, each quill so meticulously groomed it could set up its own trust fund. Those kinds of feathers.

To exactly no one's surprise, the Harrington model was far more elaborate than ours. At the centre, an exquisitely crafted replica of St Paul's Cathedral stood, encircled by the three pilot areas that were artfully arranged in an equilateral triangle—apparently, geometry equated harmony and environmental wisdom. To be fair, the symbolism had been part of the Green Horizon Initiative brief. The Harringtons had done a far better job scaling things in a way that maintained the balance, though, while our triangle had taken a rather casual approach to symmetry.

Their park area was a miniature Eden, so lush and idyllic it qualified for the cover of a fantasy novel. Then there was the residential area, generous greenery interwoven with a clever collection of glass-centric modern homes. By contrast, it made our residential concept look like slightly improved Lego houses—I was an engineer, not an architect. Their business district was more glass, more greenery, all designed by people with a keen eye for detail and a knack for pleasing aesthetics.

"Taking notes on how the pros do it?" Adam asked acidly, drawing up beside me.

"Hardly." I levelledhim with a sidelong stare. "I mean, yes, your family has a flair for style—I'll give you that. But your main energy source?" I indicated a distinctly phallic glass tower, part water sculpture and part vertical garden, meant to harness power from wind and rain. "Makes one wonder if you're trying to compensate for something."

A split second too late, I realised my mistake.

Adam's brow smoothed out, his expression tipping from irritation into smugness. "You know better than that."

I fought the distant curl of heat in my stomach and held his gaze. "In the dark, even dwarves can seem like giants."

He leaned forward, the corners of his mouth hitching up—and then a knock on the door interrupted any further escalation as the butler returned with a tray and the same air of polite indifference as before. Good. Because that was how it had started last time, wasn't it? Me pushing, Adam pushing back, until he'd dragged me away from the counter and into the narrow corridor that led to the loos, kissing me like he had something to prove. Which he did, maybe. Or maybe it had been a one-time experiment, a minor act of rebellion against the shiny path laid out for him since he'd been old enough to toddle in a straight line.

Not my fucking problem.

We waited until we were alone again, the butler closing the door as he left, before Adam sat down behind the desk. I didn't wait for his invitation as I parked my bum in the chair that faced him. Brief silence hung between us.

He was the one to end it. Lacing his hands on the desk, he leaned forward. "Listen, I studied your proposal. Some of your ideas have merit, all right? But we both know this is too big for you." His voice was serious and understanding in a way that raised my hackles.

"Do we." Crossing my arms, I made it a flat statement rather than a question.

He studied me for a moment before he sent me a calculating smile. "What's the biggest contract you fulfilled?"

Ah, right for the jugular.

"You know better than to expect an answer." I smiled back. "So I'm going to assume you just really like the sound of your own voice."

"Well, easy. It would have been overhauling the Kellys' security." He pursed his mouth. "Let me guess—worth around two hundred thousand?"

It had been two hundred and ten. According to the Kellys, our initial price tag had been slightly higher than the Harrington offer, but we'd included a five-year warranty for any devices we installed, and our service fee was far lower since we'd need to refresh the magical enhancements only once a year.

"Again," I said, "you know better than to expect an answer."

Adam sighed, shoving his hair away with one hand. It promptly fell over his forehead again. "Look, what I'm trying to get at is this: we can do this efficiently, in a way that lets you save face."

Wow, the condescension was strong in this one.

I aimed for polite curiosity. "Do enlighten me."

"We use our model as a basis." He felt an unnecessary need to nod at said model, sitting between us in all its smug perfection. "Here and there, we add a few of your ideas, like those waste recycling units. We present it to the cabinet as our aligned plan, get their buy-in, and then you can focus on those isolated aspects while we take care of the rest."

Objectively, I could maybe, possibly, see that he had about one-third of a point. I didn't feel very objective. "No."

Adam's smile drained away like water. "No?"

I leaned back in my chair, studying him. My dad had asked me to tread lightly while I was here—‘they're ruthless, Liam'—and I didn't intend to poke a disgruntled dragon. But Adam was…Oh, he was a Harrington in how he carried himself, yes. Entitlement flowed through his veins, and he was impressively powerful. But I'd never been afraid of him.

"No is that word," I began, "that people use when they don't agree with you. I expect there's a dictionary somewhere on that shelf over there, in case you want to look it up. I don't mind waiting."

Instead of a response, Adam took a calm sip of his coffee, watching me over the rim. It made me realise that the silence in this house bothered me. It was striking, almost physical in its intensity and vastly different from my family's home where it was never truly quiet, people talking over each other, music playing somewhere, and the distant hum of the North Circular filtering in when the wind was right.

"Studying me like I'm a fascinating scientific specimen won't change my answer," I told him.

"I'm just trying to understand your rationale."

"You could consider asking."

Something close to amusement flashed in his eyes and faded again, tension pulling at the corners of his mouth. "You're a smart guy?—"

"Careful there," I interrupted. "Continue buttering me up and it'll become a slip hazard around here."

Adam shot me a narrow-eyed look. "You're a smart guy, and you're not delusional. You know this is too big for your family. So why insist on being hands-on when I'm offering you an alternative that'll let you save face?" He paused, brow furrowing ever so slightly. "The project running smoothly will reflect well on you, too."

In all fairness, it made sense—in a ‘may your throne crumble under the weight of your conceit' kind of way, granted. But sense nonetheless.

"True." I let it sit between us for a moment. "It will also reflect on us how we treat the people who work for the project—and that's where I don't trust your family."

Blunt? Yes. He'd been too, though, so he could hardly complain. Also, the last time we'd discussed this topic had been a slippery slope to…yeah, well.

Adam leaned back in his chair, oozing defiant confidence. "You keep waffling on about that."

"Ever visited an active construction site?"

"I visit sometimes."

I flicked him a dismissive look. "Really."

"Yes."

"And what, exactly, would someone like you be doing there?"

His chin tipped up. Without a word, he set his coffee down, rose from his chair, and walked past me. Since I was only human, I let my gaze linger on the way his trousers clung to his exasperatingly perfect arse. Yeah, he was hot. Too bad about the personality.

He turned with a decorative sand bottle in his hands, a twitch of his lips hinting that he'd caught me looking. That was fine; I hadn't aimed for subtlety.

"Quaint," I commented, crossing one leg over the other. "Didn't take you for the kind of guy who keeps beach souvenirs. It's so…plebeian."

Still no response from him. He removed the cork and set it aside. Then, after offering me an edged smile, he threw the sand in the air.

And lit it on fire.

Holy shit.

The grains glowed a blueish white, suspended for a second before they condensed into a triangle. It turned red before Adam caught it in his open palm. I choked back a warning. Hot. The triangle, not Adam. Which, that had to be…God, I didn't remember. But I'd fucking learned this stuff during my studies. Like, blue marked the hottest part of the flame, red the coolest, and it took something like two thousand degrees to melt sand, didn't it? And clearly, my brain was grappling for the useless comfort of facts because I'd never actually seen a Nova in action.

"You wanted to know why I'd be on a construction site?" Adam took a couple of swaggering steps towards me and held out his hand. "This is why."

Glass. He'd melted the sand into a small arrow made of crystal-clear glass. Christ, what a deliberate display of power, designed to show me just how out of my depth I was. Yeah, all right—message fucking received.

I straightened my spine, curling one hand into a tight fist so I could focus on the sting of fingernails pressing into my palm. "Neat party trick." My voice wasn't as firm as I would have liked, but I pushed on regardless. "Bet it brings all the girls to the yard."

Should I feel threatened? I wasn't sure.

"You know what's funny?" Adam asked.

"I'm sure you'll enlighten me."

He looked down at me, broad shoulders, head tilted at a thoughtful angle. "You were the quiet type in school. What happened?"

It surprised me he remembered because yes, I had been the quiet type. While I'd had a handful of friends, we kept to ourselves—not drawing attention, good students who handed their homework in on time, unremarkable magic potential. I'd been adept at blending in and knew to keep my mouth shut about things that set me apart, like the ability to see magic in a way others didn't.

"How sweet of you to notice little old me at all," I told him.

He raised an eyebrow, waiting, so I shrugged one shoulder.

"First, I started working at a pub. Then I accidentally developed a weapon with massive destructive potential and became the public front of my family."

His attention sharpened on my face. "Accidentally?"

I hadn't meant to let that slip, so I adjusted course. "But enough about me—let's talk about you. So, fair enough, you visit the occasional construction site. Do you speak to any of the workers there?"

"I speak to the overseers."

"Of course." I nodded as though that made sense. "And they'll definitely tell you about things like forced overtime, insufficient breaks, broken sanitation facilities…"

He wrinkled his nose, a boyish gesture at odds with his usual poise. "Seriously, what's your obsession with this topic?"

Last time we'd argued about this, I'd omitted that my dad had used to work for them—stupidly, I'd felt like it would have put us on unequal footing. But why had I even cared? The answer, sadly, was that even in the midst of our mounting frustration with each other, I'd been aware of him.

Oh, who was I kidding? I'd been aware of him back in school, too. Everyone had been.

"My dad worked for one of your regular contractors. Unpaid overtime was expected and lunch and toilet breaks rationed."

Incredulity twisted the corners of Adam's mouth. "Which contractor?"

"J. Brown."

"We've been working with them for decades." His tone made it sound as though that ?was an antidote to suspicion. Given we presently found ourselves in a near-palace that belonged to his family and I was ready to bet that ‘profit over people' was baked into its foundation…Not so.

I stared up at him in unimpressed silence.

To my surprise, he was the one who caved first. Taking a step back, he tugged on the sleeve of his dress shirt as he turned away, voice low. "I'll look into it."

I blinked at his back. "Really?"

"Okay, listen." He sat down behind his desk and shot me a dark look. "I don't know what the hell I ever did to you, but I'm not a monster, all right? All our contractors are meant to comply with standard labour regulations. So yes, I will look into it."

It was more than I'd expected. "Consider sending someone a little less…" I gestured at his face. "Recognisable."

For a second, he seemed inclined to take offence. Then he huffed out a slow breath, lids fluttering shut as though he was praying for patience. Boy, he'd missed his calling as a drama actor, he really had.

When he opened his eyes again, he caught me watching him. Briefly, our gazes held.

This time, I was the one who looked away, down at the model sitting between us. "Okay, so we've got one week to align on a joint proposal. Shall we get started?"

Adam set the glass arrow down and took a measured sip of his coffee before he nodded. "We shall."

* * *

Three hours later,I was seeing the error in my assumptions. It wasn't sheer magical power or a particularly ruthless approach that made the Harringtons so successful, or at least it wasn't just that—no, they were stubborn as hell. At least Adam was.

Since their architectural design was far more sophisticated than ours, we'd agreed to make it the basis of our joint proposal. He'd then offered to integrate our waste recycling units into the concept, taking the place of the underground incineration chambers they'd planned.

And then—a lot of no progress. Honestly, I'd prefer getting my teeth checked because at least my dentist had a sense of humour. Adam, on the other hand? He was like a child who'd never outgrown the ‘I don't wanna' phase.

No, our heating concept wasn't better than theirs. No, the automated watering system for the park wasn't necessary—we'd just have earth and water mages drop by on a regular basis. No, we didn't need pavements that converted kinetic energy from footsteps into electrical energy.

Bloody frustrating.

I got up and scuffed a hand through my hair, just about done arguing with Adam's rather skilled impersonation of a rock wall. "You do realise," I told him, "that a compromise requires, you know, compromising?"

"Who said anything about a compromise?" The self-satisfied arch of his eyebrows further fuelled my annoyance. Good God, someone needed to take him down a peg.

"If the government thought you'd do a better job alone, they would have handed it to you."

I might have struck a nerve based on the tension that twitched around his mouth. "Or maybe," he countered, "they're trying to send a message of hope to the downtrodden." His voice tipped into American motivational coach territory. "Believe in yourself! Anything is possible! Dwarves will be giants!"

Okay, how bad would it be if I punched him? Nothing major, honest—just a little love tap to wipe that smug grin off his face. I reminded myself that I was a pacifist. Mostly.

"Is this how you typically run business negotiations?" I asked, grabbing my jacket. "Because if so, you must have an amazing aesthetic surgeon on call who fixes your nose each time it gets broken."

"Is that a threat?" He sounded amused, the bastard—like I was a funny little dog yapping at him, floppy ears and all. Yeah, we were done here.

"No." I slipped into my jacket without sparing him so much as a look. "It's just a friendly observation, that's all."

When I headed for the door, he stopped me with a silky, "Does this mean you're pulling out?"

Ha, that'd be the day.

Slowly, I pivoted to fix him with a flat look. "You know me better than that."

"Do I?" His tone hinted at that night we didn't talk about, or at least not openly. What was his game here? To keep me on my toes, I assumed. Except out of the two of us, I had no trouble admitting to my preferences. And yes, those apparently included getting off with someone who rubbed me the wrong fucking way—until he didn't.

"Well." I let a slow, calculated smile bloom on my lips. "You know what I sound like when I come on your face, for starters."

He inhaled sharply, a flush rising to his cheeks. Gotcha. I ignored the tug of arousal in my belly because fuck, it had been hot. Tangled together after I'd made him come in my hand, the shadows around us occasionally broken by the headlights of a passing car, far enough from where we'd parked that it didn't matter. We'd barely spoken since our first clashing kiss, just logistics like not here and okay, then where? So when he'd murmured, ‘You can, you know?' and had gestured at his mouth—Christ, with how dark it had been, and with most of my blood south of my brain, it had taken me a second to get his meaning.

I hadn't asked if that was his first time, and he hadn't volunteered the information. But given how he'd needed a few minutes to find his rhythm until he got comfortable taking me a bit further down? Probably.

Bloody hot.

Not the blowjob virgin part—I didn't care about being the first to walk across freshly fallen snow. No, it was the intoxicating mix of how eager he'd been and the fact that it was Adam—perfectly untouchable, always put together, the boy that all the girls had swooned over in school. And there he was, happily choking on my dick.

I realised that the air between us had grown heavy and still.

"I doubt"—his voice sounded frosted over—"that puts me in a particularly unique position."

Had he just called me a slag? I almost laughed. Maybe in my early twenties, fresh out of the insular and conservative magical school, revelling in the newfound freedom that came with attending university. In our world, children were shielded away in a separate educational system until eighteen, to prevent them from leaking our secrets. Post-graduation, the boundaries between our community and the non-magical world blurred significantly.

Anyway, I'd calmed down. I'd been busy too.

"Careful there," I told him. "One just might think you're jealous."

His lips flattened into a thin line. "Hardly."

"Aww." I pressed a hand to my heart. "Are you telling me I'm not the best you've ever had? Harsh."

His eyes narrowed. Then he glanced away, rising from behind the desk without another word, and I suddenly wondered whether I'd overstepped a line. If he actually was in the closet...Christ, there was a distinct possibility that he had little else to compare me to.

Which made me an arse.

Granted, he was a far bigger arse, but two wrongs didn't make a right. I also didn't know how to address it without basically asking him to explain his sexuality and associated experience. Not cool.

Yeah, so we were clearly done for the day. He held the door for me, and I stayed quiet as I walked past him. We headed down the hallway together, our steps echoing in the silence exuded by the walls.

"So," I began once we emerged into the vast entrance hall. "Where do we go from here?"

"You talk to your family," he said. "And I talk to mine."

That sounded remarkably abstract considering that a week from now, we'd need to present a united front to the government.

"Fine." I glanced at his profile. "My place, tomorrow at three. You need directions?"

Let's see you out of your element.

"I'll find it." Curt and precise.

All right, then.

We crossed the hall diagonally, a massive chandelier above our heads. The grandeur of the place was damn near suffocating, each gilded detail and shimmering tapestry screaming of accumulated wealth. Growing up here must have been a starkly different experience from the crowded four-bedroom flat my family had lived in until not that long ago—my parents and my grandmother, my brother, my sister, and me. Never a dull moment, that was for sure, and privacy a rare and wonderful luxury.

I would love to explore this place unsupervised. The Harringtons were of old magic, so it wasn't just their library that would be a treasure trove—somewhere here, there'd be a dedicated room for circle practice. Rituals involving hand-drawn patterns had been around for centuries, and while a few mundane ones could be found in books, the most potent ones were guarded closely and passed down within families. Only rumours circulated, from circles of power that could supercharge an already powerful mage, to recovery rituals that sped up the replenishment of one's reserves after they'd run dry, to patterns that vastly extended the reach of a person's magic.

I'd never match Adam's power. But if I could increase my own just a little, I might be able to push the boundaries of technology.

We were a few steps from the main door when it opened. A young man in running clothes came in, tracking dirt that would no doubt be mopped up within minutes. His physical resemblance to Adam was startling—the same dark hair and hazel eyes, the same straight nose and full lips. His magic, though, registered as a mere flicker. Another cousin?

The young man caught sight of us and stopped for a shy smile. "Hey."

"Liam." Adam's voice carried a trace of reluctance. "This is Gale, my brother. Gale, you've heard of Liam Morgan."

Adam's brother was a Spark, the weakest of mages?

I knew better than to blurt out the question. The ability to read someone's magic was rare and made people uncomfortable, so Nan Jean had taught me to fake ignorance. But, wow. If this was any other family, it wouldn't have been out of the ordinary—magical power was distributed in a pyramid, with Sparks the most common, Blazes already less so, Suns fairly rare, and just a few dozen Novas in our entire London community.

But families like the Harringtons married for optimal chances to produce powerful heirs. Clearly, it had failed with Gale, and it had failed with Adam's cousin Christian too. Was this why Gale rarely attended events with the rest of his family—did they hide him away? Then again, Christian had been present at the Blackwoods' ball for the Initiative, so maybe not. Gale must have been around in school, but given he was several years younger than Adam and me, I hadn't actively noticed him.

Poor lad, though. Disappointment would be a heavy weight on his shoulders.

"Pleasure," I said, offering a bright smile along with my hand.

"Pleasure?" Adam echoed somewhat incredulously while Gale's fingers gripped mine for a brief, cautious shake. "I thought you hated us all on principle."

"Not quite," I told Adam. "Just those of you involved in the family business. Since I don't remember hearing much about you"—I nodded at Gale—"I'm gonna go with innocent until proven guilty."

To my surprise, Gale shifted to stand next to Adam, a small frown creasing his brow. "I do stuff in the background. Like, I helped with our proposal and Adam's pitch for the Green Horizon Initiative."

Hmm. Either my relative ignorance had insulted Gale, or he was defending his brother. Hard to say. The softening around Adam's mouth implied it was the latter, though.

"Gale just completed his Master's in architecture," Adam informed me. "He designed the residential district of our proposal."

"Not by myself." Even though Gale ducked his head, it didn't quite hide the pleased quirk of his lips.

Okay, this was weird. Adam wasn't ...kind, for lack of a better word. Or warm. He was proud and cold, confident in a way that I both admired and despised.

"Nice design," I told Gale. "Couple it with some of our ideas and we're on to—what was it?" I slid Adam a sly grin. "A revolution?"

"Revolutions are only as good as the people running them."

Ah, there was the perfectly infuriating Adam that I knew. I let my grin widen. "Revolutions also question the established order, so they're typically led by the underdogs."

Adam flicked me an unimpressed look. "The American Revolution would beg to differ."

"An exception that proves the rule."

"Oh, do we pick and choose our facts now?"

Gale's gaze moved from me to Adam and back, a spectator at a clown show. Welcome to the circus.

"It's called context." I felt abruptly tired. Three hours spent with a guy who wouldn't hesitate to pounce on the slightest hint of perceived weakness could do that to a person. "Anyway." I started for the front door that Gale had left open, a cool breeze wafting in. "Adam, let's pick this up tomorrow. Gale, nice to meet you."

"You too." To Gale's credit, he didn't sound sarcastic.

"See you tomorrow," Adam said with all the enthusiasm of someone preparing for a colonoscopy. Right there with you, mate.

I stepped out into a crisp evening, gravel crunching under my shoes. Once the door fell shut behind me, I took a slow, deep breath. If this had been an indication of how the rest of this collaboration would go? God, it would be a painful, painful experience.

But if Adam mistook me for the type to give up? Well. He'd learn.

* * *

Oil,sawdust, metal, and spices. The familiar mix of scents hit me as soon as I got out of my car.

Which was also when I realised Adam would smell the same thing tomorrow. Jesus, what had I been thinking? Sure, it would put him on the back foot, but it also meant direct exposure to my family. That was…not good. Was, in fact, very bad. Because there were no secrets in my family, and so I'd mentioned my ill-advised hookup with Adam even if I'd kept the details to myself. They also knew that back in school, I'd nurtured just the tiniest crush on him.

It was par for the course, all right? Now, for the record, I'd never sunk so low as to join one of the secret message boards that existed for every young, hot, and presumably powerful son of a wealthy magical family. I wasn't my sister Laurie, who'd flitted from drooling over some teen pop sensation to Cassandra Hartley's youngest brother and back. But, yeah. There'd been a very brief, very contained five seconds of my life when I'd looked for Adam's face in the school corridors. Then my father had begun to work for the Harringtons and my illusions had dissolved like a biscuit dipped into a cup of black coffee. Good riddance.

That didn't make me immune to my family's teasing, of course. It wasn't an issue when it was the six of us, joking at the kitchen table—but it would be very much an issue if they didn't keep their traps shut with Adam around.

Rules would need to be set.

I locked my car and entered the house through the attached workshop, where creative anarchy reigned supreme. Jack and Laurie were huddled over something I recognised as a blown-up component of our aquarium-sized waste recycler, tools strewn around them. They glanced up at my entrance.

"Hey!" Laurie sat back on her heels, a smudge of grease on her cheek, light brown hair up in a messy bun. "How was it?"

I blew a breath through my nose. "Like trying to explain Wi-Fi to Nan Jean."

"That good, huh?" Jack asked.

"I'll give you the director's cut at dinner, but…" I shook my head. "We've got one week to come up with a joint proposal. Right now, I'm not sure we'll get there."

"Offer sexual favours," Laurie suggested.

Jack snorted. "He's been there, done that."

"Maybe a refresher is in order," she said.

"That," Jack jumped in again, "would suggest it wasn't all that memorable the first time around."

"Are you charging admission for this double act?" I asked. Best if they got it out of the way now, though. It increased the chances that they'd behave tomorrow.

Oh, who was I kidding?

After trading a few more insults, I left them to their tools and moved on, the warmth of the main house welcoming me. A tumble of shoes cluttered the entryway, jackets draped over two coat racks, and the swirling pattern of the ceramic floor tiles added to the chaos. It wasn't gleaming marble and opulent chandeliers, wasn't a mansion in Hampstead Garden Suburb—just a cramped five-bedroom house from the seventies in East Finchley. But it was ours, and it was enough.

I wasn't sure ‘enough' even featured in the Harringtons' vocabulary.

My parents were in the kitchen, dad chopping vegetables while mum cracked eggs into a bowl. They both turned at my entrance. Without a word, I crossed over to the liquor cabinet above our fridge, fished out a bottle of grappa, and went to pour myself a finger's width. Each time I blinked, the memory of burning sand shimmered behind my lids.

"Does this call for an intervention?" Mum asked Dad.

"The Harringtons will do that to a person," he said.

"It's well past five o'clock," I told them, "and I've earned this. We made a total of no progress today. It's like he expects me to worship at his altar."

"Well," Dad said slowly, in the kind of voice that always marked his jokes. "To be fair, you have."

"Okay, one?" I took a small sip that burned on the way down, then tossed my dad a lopsided smile. "His dick is not an altar. Two, I am so not having this conversation with you. And three, he's coming over tomorrow afternoon, so you might want to make plans that take you elsewhere."

Mum paused in washing her hands. "Adam Harrington is coming here?"

"He is. He also claimed to have no idea about J. Brown." I shrugged at my dad. "He said he'd look into it."

Dad's forehead creased in thought. "Did he?"

Another sip. "Yeah."

"Well." For a moment, Dad considered me before he nodded. "I guess we'll see."

"I guess we will," I agreed and took another sip.

Maybe Adam would follow through, yeah. But I sincerely doubted it.