killing Keith for Alchemist blood?"
"Yeah... but Keith left too soon."
"Well, there you go. Even a psychopath recognized your worth enough to want to kill someone else first."
I didn't know whether to laugh or cry. "That doesn't make me feel better."
Adrian shrugged. "My earlier point remains. You're a solid person, Sage. You're easy on the eyes, if a little skinny, and your ability to memorize useless information is going to totally hook in some guy. Put Keith and Lee out of your head because they have nothing to do with your future."
"Skinny?" I asked, hoping I wasn't blushing. I also hoped if I sounded outraged enough, he wouldn't notice how much the other comment had disarmed me. Easy on the eyes. Not exactly the same as being told I was hotness incarnate or drop-dead gorgeous. But after a lifetime of having my appearance judged as "acceptable," it was a heady compliment - especially coming from him.
"I just tell it like it is."
I almost laughed. "Yes. Yes, you do. Now tell me about a different subject, please. I'm tired of this one."
"Sure thing." Adrian infuriated me sometimes, but I had to admit, I loved his short attention span. It made dodging uncomfortable topics so much easier. Or so I thought. "Do you smell that?"
An image of the bodies flashed into my head, and for a moment, all I could think he meant was the smell of decay. Then I sniffed more deeply. "I smell the paint, and... wait... is that pine?"
He looked impressed. "Damn straight. Pine-scented cleaner. As in, I cleaned." He gestured to the kitchen dramatically. "With these hands, these hands that don't do manual labor."
I stared off into the kitchen. "What did you use it on? The cupboards?"
"The cupboards are fine. I cleaned the floor and the counter." I must have looked more puzzled than amazed because he added, "I even got down on my knees."
"You used pine cleaner on the floor and counters?" I asked. The floor was ceramic tile; the counters were granite.
Adrian frowned. "Yeah, so?"
He seemed so proud to have actually scrubbed something for once in his life that I couldn't bring myself to tell him pine cleaner was generally only used on wood. I gave him an encouraging smile. "Well, it looks great. I need you to come over and clean my new dorm room now. It's covered in dust."
"No way, Sage. My own housecleaning's bad enough."
"But is it worth it? If you'd stayed at Clarence's, you had a live-in cook and cleaner."
"It's definitely worth it. I've never really, truly had my own place. I kind of did at Court... but it might as well have been an over-glorified dorm room. This? This is great. Even with the housecleaning. Thank you."
The comic look of horror he'd worn while discussing housecleaning had been traded away for utter seriousness now as those green eyes weighed me.
I suddenly felt uncomfortable under the scrutiny and was reminded of the spirit dream, where I'd questioned if his eyes really were that green in real life.
"For what?" I asked.
"For this - I know you must have twisted some Alchemist arms." I hadn't told him that I'd actually passed on taking the place for myself. "And for everything else. For not giving up on me, even when I was being a major asshole. And, you know, for that saving my life thing."
I looked away. "I didn't do anything. That was Eddie - and Jill. They're the ones who saved you."
"Not sure I would've been alive for their rescue if you hadn't set that bitch on fire. How did you do that?"
"It was nothing," I protested. "Just a, uh, chemical reaction from the Alchemist bag of tricks."
Those eyes studied me again, weighing the truth of my words. I'm not sure he believed me, but he let it go. "Well, from the look on her face, your aim was right on. And then you got backhanded for it. Anyone who takes a hit for Adrian Ivashkov deserves some credit."
I turned my back to him, still shy with the praise - and nervous about the fire reference - and walked over to the window. "Yeah, well, you can rest easy that it was a selfish act. You have no idea what a pain it is to file paperwork for a dead Moroi."
He laughed, and it was one of the few times I'd heard him laugh with genuine humor and warmth - and not because of something twisted or sarcastic.
"Okay, Sage. If you say so. You know,