Page 46 of Dark Gambit: The Play

Wrapping his arm around her narrow shoulders, he leaned and kissed her temple. "If she gets heavy, I'll carry her the rest of the way."

Sofia gave him a small smile. "It's okay. I can carry her. She gives me warmth."

Marcel knew that she wasn't talking about the physical sensation. The cat showed her more affection than he had since the whole thing exploded in Emmett's office, and she had no one else to lean on.

33

SOFIA

Was Marcel warming up to her? Or was he just trying to be nice to boost her confidence for the call?

Probably the second one, and how sad was that.

Maybe she shouldn't pine for a guy that could form an instantaneous ice shield around his heart. Now that she was free to choose her man, she should find someone stable and free of emotional issues. Someone who would remain steadfast no matter what.

Yeah, dream on. As if such a creature exists.

Life was a long journey of disappointments and betrayals, and the sooner she resigned herself to that reality, the sooner her heart would stop bleeding. Every time she'd allowed herself to hope that someone other than her father and her aunts and cousins actually cared for her, she'd been disappointed. But perhaps instead of complaining, she should count her blessings for having a family who cared about her.

Some people didn't even have that.

When they got to her spot, she pulled the earpieces out of their case and stuffed them into her ears.

Marcel checked that they properly sealed her ear canal, and then took the cat from her.

"Do you need a moment alone?" he asked.

Hearing the male machine voice was jarring. It made her realize that Marcel's voice hadn't been completely devoid of emotion before.

Eleanor's pinched expression communicated that having a moment wasn't an option. She was there to ensure that Sofia didn't stray from the storyline they'd agreed upon, but since she had the earpieces in, all Eleanor could do if she strayed from the script was to stop the communication like she had done in Emmett's office.

Except, how would she know?

Sofia wasn't going to talk with her grandfather in English, and neither Eleanor nor Marcel had said anything about knowing Russian. Maybe they were wearing translating earpieces too?

Eleanor's long wavy hair was down and covered her ears, but Marcel wasn't wearing any.

"That's okay. Just give me some space so I can pretend I'm alone."

Nodding, he took a couple of steps back and motioned for Eleanor to do the same.

Sofia took a deep breath, pulled the earpiece from the pendant, and pressed it against the other device.

That had been the easy part. The hard part was pressing the picture to activate the communication. Her hand shook so badly that she had to close her eyes and focus on forcing her finger to move.

"Sofia," Valstar barked into her ear. "What happened?"

Even with the machine voice, she knew it was him. Igor's word choice would have been different.

"It was a close call. I didn't know that Emmett's girlfriend was listening in on the line from the other room, or that she was a compeller and realized right away what was going on. She knew that Emmett wouldn't have admitted to any wrongdoing, especially not to a stranger on the phone. She terminated the call and accused me of being an undercover journalist. I panicked. I didn't know what to do, but the tears did their job." She chuckled. "Marcel came in and calmed things down."

"They took away your pendant. How come they gave it back?"

"I came up with a great story." She repeated what she'd rehearsed with Eleanor and Emmett. "They brought a truth-teller to verify that I wasn't lying, and I thought that I was done for, but he didn't detect the lie. I don't know if he was a fake or if my Kra-ell heritage protected me, but somehow, he believed me, and I was so relieved. Anyway, after that, they invited me to join their community and gave me my family heirloom back." She chuckled. "They might be paranormally talented, but they are not very technologically savvy. They didn't realize that the pendant is a communication device."

"Hold on for a moment," Valstar said. "Igor wants to speak with you."

"Of course."