Chapter 7: The Second Try
Julian didn’t move at first. Selene did, taking his arm and pulling him a step back toward the side door, murmuring something too low for the rest of the room to catch. Whatever she was saying, it had the practiced, urgent cadence of someone who’d done damage control for him before, who knew exactly which tone of voice made him stop digging.
“Mira,” Julian tried again, his eyes finding mine over Selene’s shoulder. “If you’d give me a chance to explain properly, without all of this,” a small, almost helpless gesture toward the assembled guests, the flowers, the towering arrangement of white lilies that now struck me as faintly absurd, “I think you’d understand why.”
“I understand enough.” I looked at him until he stopped talking. It didn’t take long. “You explai
