us acknowledged her. Sera’s gaze was locked in mine. At least, that’s what I thought until I tried to look away and discovered I was as trapped by the look in her eyes as she was by the doors I’d screwed shut.
The difference was that I didn’t want to escape.
I should have moved my hand, but Sera hadn’t moved her leg, so I left my hand where it was and let the heat bleeding through her denim warm one side of my thumb. “Take off your scarf,” I said, and my voice was lower than I’d meant for it to be. Deeper. I didn’t think she’d comply, but her gaze held mine while she unwound the thin material from her neck and shoulders. She handed it to me and I held it for a second, stunned by the realization that the yellow scarf from my notebook weighed nothing.
And that it smelled just like her. Clean, and vaguely sweet and enticing, in a way I could never have put into words, but would never, ever forget.
Kori cleared her throat and I blinked in surprise, then realized I was still staring at Sera from less than a foot away, and now I was fingering her silk scarf like some kind of pervert with an accessories fetish.
I rocked back onto my heels and draped her scarf over the foot of my grandmother’s bed, hoping my face wasn’t as red as it felt.
“We still need to see your arm.” I stood and Sera stared up at me, and I wished I knew her well enough to understand the intense blend of strength, fear and anger warring behind her eyes. “You want me to step outside?”
Her fingers found the hem of her shirt and her gaze hardened. “I don’t care what you do.”
But that was a lie. Women who don’t care what you do have no reason to tell you that.
I started to turn, to give her some privacy, but she turned faster. She pulled her left arm out of its long sleeve, then lifted that side of her shirt to her shoulder, revealing half of a slim, almost delicate waist above the denim clinging to the swell of her hip.
My throat felt tight. I tried not to stare. When that didn’t work, I tried not to look like I was staring. If Kori noticed, I couldn’t tell. She was fixated on Sera’s arm, as I should have been.
With the front of her shirt clutched to her chest, Sera twisted to show us her left arm, and I exhaled in relief before I realized she would hear that, and that she might understand how badly I’d wanted her to be unaffiliated with the Towers, and not just for her own sake. Not just for Kenley’s sake.
For my sake.
Her arm was smooth and pale, and completely unmarked. She was free from obligation not just to the Towers, but to any of the other syndicates who routinely marked their employees in the same spot. And that was most of them.
Sera was unbound.
Based on the lack of dead marks, she’d never been bound, which would explain her incomprehension of just how vile the syndicates really were. But if that was the case—if she didn’t work for Julia Tower—why had my notebook told me to take her? How was she supposed to help us get Kenley back?
Maybe she wasn’t. My head spun with that possibility. Maybe Sera wasn’t supposed to help me. Maybe I was supposed to help her.
Kori shrugged, arms folded over her chest, while Sera slid her arm back into its sleeve. “Well, assuming the rest of her is as spotless as her arm, I’m good with letting her walk around unfettered until Anne gets here.”
“Me, too.” I hadn’t planned to tie her up at all until she tried to climb out the window.
“The rest of me is fine, but I’m not showing you anything else.” When Sera turned to face us, I saw that her resolution was just as firmly back in place as her shirt. “I’m not a prostitute.”
“We know,” I assured her.
Kori shrugged again. “I believe you, but what I believe doesn’t matter. You have to make Anne believe.” She turned to me, already reaching for the doorknob. “I’ll go get her.” Then she stepped into the hall and left the door open behind her back.
“She’s...interesting.” Sera glanced at the bed, as if she was considering sitting, then she sat in the chair instead. “Kinda scary.”
“Yeah. I’d like to say that’s Tower’s fault, but