“And for a moment, I thought… maybe I could kill him. Maybe I could do it. Maybe he shouldn’t even exist; maybe the world would be better without him. But my god,” she gasped, “who am I to decide that?”

“Whatever.” He rubbed his temple. “Look, definitely don’t tell Fowler—” “I don’t tell Ezra anything,” she snapped, preemptively irritated. “Certainly not anymore.”

For such a smart girl, she could be really stupid.

She had always had a bit of a look to her as if she might immediately report any wrongdoing; that she was currently dressed like a page from the spring catalogue for school prefects (square-neck cardigan, pleated skirt, ballet flats) certainly didn’t help.

She stepped forward and Parisa smiled approvingly, reaching up to hand her the bottle. Libby collapsed on Tristan’s other side, taking a sip.

“Careful, Varona. You know this auditorium’s on a fault line, don’t you?”

Libby paused to conjure something terrible; a final, devastating parting malediction. Something to haunt him while she walked away. But then instead, she held a hand out to him, deciding to be an adult. Civil. Et cetera.

It was enough of a thrill to have Tristan’s tongue in her mouth, his arm wound tightly around her ribs, but then Libby reached out further, finding the silk of Parisa’s slip dress.

“Yes,” Atlas agreed, and nodded briskly. “Any questions?” Libby opened her mouth but, to Callum’s immense relief, Nico’s hand shot out, pausing her.

“Ezra, listen to me carefully, because this is the last time I’ll say it.” She took three steps to close the distance between them, slamming the book shut on the last argument she planned to have today. “I am not,” Libby said flatly, “yours.”

If Adrian Caine had ever met Libby Rhodes, he wouldn’t have hesitated to buy her somehow.

“Varona, that presumes I care at all what you think.”

For a moment, half a lucid thought flashed through Libby’s mind before reverting to base sensations: hands, tongues, lips, teeth. Somehow Tristan’s chest was bare, and she dug her nails into the fibers of his muscle, his skin sparking where she touched it.

There it was again: Incensed.

“Rhodes, listen—” “—at very least we could model it, couldn’t we? I mean, if you can see it, then—” “Rhodes, for fuck’s sake!” She looked up, startled, to find Tristan staring down at her. “Thank you,” he said. “Jesus, fuck. I just wanted to say thank you.”

Nico’s shrugged. “I don’t like him.” “Oh no,” Libby lamented facetiously. “Whatever will I do without your approval?”

Parisa kissed Libby’s neck, the tip of her tongue tracing a line across Libby’s throat. Libby slid a hand gracelessly up Parisa’s thigh and Tristan groaned in Libby’s mouth; evidence Parisa’s other hand must have found an equally suitable location.

Libby paused to conjure something terrible; a final, devastating parting malediction. Something to haunt him while she walked away.

She had such a ceaseless way of making him wonder what on earth she was talking about.

No one could find her.