wanted you to do it. I wanted you to keep Wythe’s mantle safe. You knew that, and because I thought it was safe, you did, too. She used me to get you to do what she wanted.”
Lily cocked her head, studying him. “You are truly, deeply pissed at your Lady.”
Yes. Yes, he was. Too angry to speak, the muscles of his jaws clenched tight on all that anger.
“As I understand it, the deal between your people and the Lady is that she gets to use you. You give her permission for that.”
He unlocked his jaws enough to say, “Not against you.”
“I gave permission, too.”
“You didn’t know what you were agreeing to.”
“Part of me did. No, wait, listen.” She put her hands on each side of his face as if she knew how tight he was there. How much he was holding back, holding in. “The first time, when Brian was dying, I didn’t notice anything like that. If the Lady was telling me things about what I’d agreed to, I didn’t notice it. But I think she did, because this time . . . in Ruben’s kitchen, I knew. I didn’t get any of it in words, but I knew exactly what I agreed to when I let that mantle go and flow into Ruben. The part of me she can talk to, it doesn’t have words, so I can’t hold on to what she says. I just know she cleared it with me first, and I agreed. I think that happened the first time, too, only it was such a different way of—of talking—I forgot it even happened.”
He felt like he was swimming in smoke—thick, acrid, and blinding both nose and eyes. He didn’t know what to say. What to think.
Lily stroked his face and spoke gently. “So the thing is, if you’re mad at the Lady for what she did, you have to be mad at me, too. It turned out okay, but she and I both risked me.”
“It didn’t turn out okay. You’ve lost your career.”
“I kind of think that’s the Great Bitch’s fault. And Friar’s. And maybe Sjorensen, or Drummond, or even Mullins. Someone set me up, but that someone wasn’t your Lady. She took advantage of the situation, I guess, to get me to go to Ruben so she could pass on the mantle. But she didn’t set me up.”
“You wouldn’t have gone there in person if she hadn’t tricked you into it. You’d have called, but you wouldn’t have been there when Drummond showed up. You wouldn’t have been arrested.”
“And if Ruben’s phone is tapped—and I’m betting it is—calling would have had the same result for me, but Ruben wouldn’t have gotten the mantle. He’d probably be in jail now instead of at Wythe Clanhome.”
The anger that had ridden him for days was draining out. Or burning down, if not out, leaving everything smoke and fog. He shook his head, but it did nothing to banish the fog. “You’re okay with it. You’re okay with being manipulated that way.”
“I’m okay with it the same way I’m okay with the mate bond. Or your father.”
That startled him into silence.
She grinned. “If you could see your face . . . what I mean is, sometimes it drives me crazy, not knowing what the mate bond’s going to do, and I hate that, but the bond makes me part of something other than me. There would be an ‘us’ even without the bond, but it helps, doesn’t it? When I was locked up, I knew you were hundreds of miles away, but that was good. It meant you and Ruben had gotten away, and knowing that helped. It helped a lot.”
“And my father?” he said dryly.
“He reminds me of the Lady.” She paused, her frown saying it was hard to find words. “I heard her. I didn’t get words, but I heard her voice, and . . . you know how Isen is. Tricky, sometimes manipulative. He never tells you everything, and you never know what he’s going to do. But whatever it is, it will be done with a clean heart. The Lady can be tricky, too, and she sure as hell doesn’t tell us much, and I have no idea what she’s going to do, and I don’t like that. But I think ... I feel like she’s got a clean heart. Like she’s clean all the way through.”
He put both arms around her and pulled her close and rested his head on top of