“Whatever. Take a seat or Lily is going to be annoyed. Miu would tell you to post up near the door. Probably.”
“She would,” Andrea confirmed. Her eyes peered at him for a second over the top of her tablet.
She’d changed since they started actually started sleeping with each other.
She was her normal and chipper self; she touched him casually a little more often, but nothing obvious.
Then there were times where she touched him when they were alone somewhere, times when her touch was far more intimate.
The door opened and Lily entered. She was dressed in a dark black jacket, white blouse, and dark black pencil skirt. Her hair was tied back in her professional style, though most surprising was that she was wearing glasses.
“Agent Smith should be arriving in fifteen minutes.” Lily crossed the distance to where he sat at the conference table and dropped into the chair next to him at his left side. “Andie, Vicky.”
Both women nodded their head to Lily.
Felix quirked a brow, smiling at Lily.
Reaching up, she adjusted her hair with a touch and then looked down at herself. Looking back up to him, she frowned. “What? You’re looking at me in a strange way.
“And not in the normal, stripping me of my clothes and devouring me way.”
Felix snorted and reached out. He pushed her glasses up higher on the bridge of her nose. “Didn’t realize you had a prescription.
“And how would you know what I do to you in my mind while looking at you?”
Lily pressed her lips together into a line. “Yes, I’m a bit nearsighted. I ran out of contacts and forgot to order more.”
“Wear the glasses more often. Your eyes are lovely, it brings the focus on them.”
Lily smiled at him, then looked to Andrea over his shoulder. “He’s been much more of a smooth talker since you tamed him.”
Andrea chuckled, not arguing the point.
Felix wasn’t quite sure how he felt about the fact that everyone knew Andrea and he were sleeping together.
“Anyways. My eyes aren’t the topic, though thank you for the compliment. Agent Smith is definitely the reason we’re all tied up financially. I also found out what’s going on with that slave tax bologna.”
“Bologna?”
“Complete bologna. Yes, there will be a tax, but it isn’t being put into place for a while yet. They’re still going through the assessment faze. He’s trying to shake us down.
“The freeze on our assets is probably part of a toolset to help them determine what we should be paying when the tax goes live.
“Best I can tell, it’ll be repealed tonight.”
“Huh. Good work. How’d you find all this out?”
“Wraith and our police informant. Doesn’t hurt that we kept all that petty cash on hand. I’ve been using it to grease wheels. We’ll need more.”
“You know what, Lily? You’re fantastic. I cannot imagine Legion without you.”
“You still owe me, remember? Now you owe me two nice things. Spoil me, already.”
“Fine, whatever. Two favors of your choosing. Get it put down in a meeting and we’ll take care of it. No limit, except anything along the lines of ‘free me,’ cause that ain’t going to happen. Sorry, too valuable.”
Lily lifted up a hand with one finger held up. Her shoulders were set and her body had gone rigid. “Anything?”
“Well, anything within reason. But yeah, I can promise to be receptive to whatever you ask.”
“I’ll hold you to that. We can talk after this meeting. I do have a favor already in mind. I’ve been working on getting it set up, one of the reasons I didn’t bother you about it yet. I finally got most of it taken care of.”
Felix was curious now. He really didn’t know much about Lily. She kept to herself when it came to her past and about herself in general.
“You damn tease. That’s all you’re going to say, isn’t it?”
Lily’s tension melted away in a heartbeat, replaced with the vibrant soul-stealing monster.
“Of course. I have to keep you coming back for more. Ever since you started playing bedroom games with your wolf over there, you don’t pay me as much attention.”
Andrea started giggling at that. “Bedroom games?”
“There’s lots of games. We’re having lunch tomorrow, aren’t we?”
“Uh-huh. You promised me a different type of pancake. Creepies or something.”
“Crepes, but yes. Not quite pancakes, but similar enough.
“We’ll talk about games then. We haven’t talked recently. I think our little leader here has been trying to keep you away from me.”
“No. Just busy. We were setting up the Other armory.”
Felix sighed and looked to Victoria as the two kept chatting.
“As you can see, I’m a passenger most of the time. Just along for the ride.”
The swordswoman shrugged her shoulders. “Most of us kinda assumed you were already sleeping with Lily and Andrea. There’s even a pool going as to how big you’re going to make your harem and who’s next.”
“A pool? Seriously?”
“It’s not that surprising. People bet on anything. And you do kinda own everyone.”
“Huh. So, who’s in the lead in the pool right now? Maybe I can swing it in my favor with a rumor and split the payout with the person.”
“Ah… that is…” she started.
“What, Kit? Ioana? I mean, seriously. Ioana isn’t my type, and she’s with Felicia. Kit… don’t get me wrong, she’s pretty, but she’s a touch on the girl scout side for what I do for that to work.”
“Right now, it’s me. I spend the most time with you among anyone in your senior leadership circle. I’m… I’m at the top of the pool.”
“That’s… unexpected. I mean, you’re definitely in my strike zone, but we just met a week ago.”
Felix shook his head. He never quite understood how people perceived relationships in that fashion.
He tried to deal with everything from a black-and-white perspective. Relationships were very much not black or white.
“—then I gagged and almost threw up,” Andrea said sadly.
“You need to practice first.” Lily shifted in her chair and leaned towards Andrea.
Felix sat up straight and jumped into their conversation.
“Yeah, no. That conversation is over. Let’s get ready for Smith,” Felix said quickly, slapping his palms to the table.
It was one thing for everyone to know he was sleeping with Andrea. It was altogether too much for him when they discussed their sex life aloud as if it were polite dinner conversation.
He turned a full glare on Andrea, who only smiled at him. She lifted her tablet up in front of her face, only covering her nose and mouth, her eyes watching him.
“Seriously, is there anything I need to know?”
Lily shook her head and then lifted her hands up in surrender. “Realistically, there’s not much more we can do but wait to talk to him. We can’t do anything more till then.”
Andrea tapped her tablet and Lily’s chimed in response.
Lily picked her tablet up, tapped at it, then laughed.
Oh my God, they’re sending messages about it since I told them to stop talking.
Chapter 27 - Favors -
The conference phone in the center of the table started to ring.
Felix quirked a brow, forgetting Lily and Andrea altogether.
Tapping the accept button, he leaned over the speaker.
“This is Felix.”
“Mr. Campbell, I have Agent Smith on the line. I believe we were expecting him in person, but… he’s trying to call in,” came back the Andrea secretary’s voice.
“Alright. Patch him through, then.”
Felix didn’t care for this; it felt weird and didn’t make that much sense to him. Smith had set this meeting up and had asked for it to be in person.
Tapping the mute button, he looked around the room.
“This isn’t right. Lily, any chance you can get a report from Wraith as soon as possible?”