Page 61 of Shadow Burn

“That’s interference,” Jasper said.

“She’s on my team.” Katherine winked.

Priss emerged from beneath the chair with the ball in her mouth, dropped it at Katherine’s feet, and chirped.

“See?” Katherine said. “Excellent judgment.”

Jasper pointed his paddle at the cat. “You’re lucky you’re a hero.”

Priss sat and began washing her face.

By the time Katherine won the second game, she was breathing hard, her cheeks were warm, and the room had lost the edges it had carried all day.

The deadline still existed. Upton still wanted her back at Langley. The man in the mask was still out there. But for twenty minutes, she’d moved her body without feeling trapped in it. It felt good.

She set the paddle down with great dignity. “Tie.”

Jasper looked at her as if she had just committed fraud in front of witnesses. “We have to play a third game.”

“I have to get back to the papers.”

He folded his arms, still smiling, and her pulse skipped. “You’re leaving before I can reclaim dominance.”

“You never had dominance.”

“I won the first game.”

“Beginner’s luck.”

He laughed again. She soaked up the sight of him standing across the ping-pong table with his hair slightly mussed from the game, his eyes warmer than they’d been all day, his body relaxed in a way she hadn’t seen since before the intruder. While playing, they’d been something other than hunted archivist and protector, something easier and more dangerous because it felt almost normal.

“Thank you,” she said.

A crease formed between his brows. “For losing?”

She pointed at the table. “For this.”

He nodded. “You needed a reset.”

“I did.”

“So you’re admitting I was right.”

“You could pretend to be humble.”

The smile turned wicked. “I’m saving my energy for the rematch.”

She shook her head, but she was still smiling when they left the common area. Priss trotted ahead of them, tail high, apparently satisfied with the outcome of the evening’s athletic event.

“I’d like the rest of that sandwich,” Katherine said.

Jasper’s smug look made her punch his arm, but he retrieved it from the kitchen. She finished it off on the walk back to his office. The thread pulling Katherine back to the Vance papers was still there, but it wasn’t as tight now. Her shoulders had loosened. Her breathing had settled. She could think again.

Just as they were about to enter Jasper’s office, Vivi came around the corner from the residential wing.

She wasn’t running, but there was urgency in the way she moved. Her gaze landed on Jasper first, then Katherine, and the lightness from the game room vanished.

“Jasper,” Vivi said. “We have a visitor at the gate.”