Page 33 of Maksym

I leaned back. “You understand.”

“I have never had a mate before you.”

The answer was so direct it stole my next breath.

Four hundred and thirty-five years, he had said earlier. A span of time large enough to make human loneliness look like a bad afternoon.

Not my problem, I told myself. And yet the table seemed quieter after he said it.

“So you are speculating.”

“I am relying on accounts from mated pairs and historical records.”

“Ah. Peer review.”

There it was again, the faint glimmer at the corner of his mouth. This time he did not let it become a smile.

“Something like that.”

“You said blood wine,” I said. “From around the world?”

“Yes. There are vintners who specialize in blends. Some are old families. Some are witch-assisted. Some are modern operations with laboratory precision and appalling labels.”

That surprised another almost-laugh from me, but I held it behind my teeth.

His expression warmed anyway. “The palace cellars are extensive. You will never be without what you need.”

There it was. The promise. The cage hidden inside comfort, or comfort hidden inside the cage. I could not yet tell.

“I understand my closet has been stocked,” I said, because Millie had mentioned clothing and because I needed to move from blood to cotton.

“Yes.”

“With what?”

“Clothing in several sizes. Comfortable things first. Sleepwear. Robes. Undergarments. Shoes. Toiletries in the bathroom. Anything unsuitable will be replaced.”

“You had someone guess my underwear size.”

A flush of something almost human crossed his cheekbones. It was faint. It was absurd. It was there.

I stared.

“Taras and I had the staff handle things,” he said.

“Coward.”

The word escaped before I could catch it.

Then he laughed under his breath, not the full, bright sound from before, but enough to loosen something in the room.

I looked away because I did not want to be caught participating in it.

Everything about this man was different. He claimed I was his mate.

And beneath everything, beneath the shock and anger and the clinical construction I tried to build from information, there was the pull.

I had been pretending not to name it.