Barren Vows (Fates of the Bound 3)

“I don’t understand why any of this is necessary, Mother. Everyone suspects. They knew the moment you sent Lila to the clinic. Just because it isn’t in the common press yet, doesn’t mean it isn’t on the lips of the highborn on the estate. It will have spread throughout the compound and the rest of the city after the Closing Ball.”

“Perhaps no one would suspect Lila’s business if you hadn’t spent the entire night caterwauling about yours. There’s only so much damage control that I can do, and our staff has ears. So, as I said, I suggest you act with care.”

“Don’t blame the staff, Mother,” Lila said. “Everyone knows because you’ve begun to leak it, at least my intention to take a lover at the Closing Ball. Mother’s playing her little games again,” she said as she sat at her place, wine in hand.

“Leaked it? Why would I do that?”

“So that the senators attending the Closing Ball don’t commit for the season, at least not until they receive an answer from me. I suspect Senator Dubois has already been busy today, shuttling the information to choice prospects.”

Dubois’s gentle expression turned to a frown, and he stared intently at his plate.

“It’s okay, Senator Dubois, you’ll be a Randolph soon. You should get used to being my mother’s puppet. Sometimes you might even get paid for it.” Lila stared at her mother. “Who else has been your puppet recently?”

As expected, her mother’s gaze did not waver. “I am often a spectator to those who ill-use people in silly schemes. I do not believe that Senator Dubois feels ill-used on this occasion. Do you, senator?”

Jewel fiddled with her spoon.

Dubois sensed her unease and rubbed her back soothingly. “Of course I don’t. Why would I? If your mother had not given me her blessing, then my friends would have felt slighted and betrayed. Should I have kept such information from my very best friends, from my brothers and cousins?”

“What did you tell them about my situation?”

“Only what you said before, that you were in the mood to take a suitor for the season.”

“So none of them know that I will be prime?”

Dubois shook his head. “I would never betray you like that. I consider you a dear friend, madam. We are to be a family soon.”

Pax’s stomach growled, and he glanced up in embarrassment.

“Well then, shall we call Ms. Wilson back and eat as a civilized family?” the chairwoman asked, her gaze landing on Jewel. “You should take care with your behavior, child. You’ll scare away your beloved if you aren’t careful, and then poor Lila will be free to run the security office once again. Where would that leave you in the end?”

“Jewel couldn’t scare me away.” Dubois chuckled. “I love everything about her even when she lets her passions rule.”

Jewel gave a hard little smile and said nothing more for the rest of the meal.

Lila didn’t either. She listened as Pax described two difficult operations that he had observed earlier in the day. Both patients had required surgery for heart problems. One ha

d been his own age.

Dubois encouraged every detail. “Pax, you should join one of my mother’s focus groups,” he said during a lull. “She’ll be testing some new games at the start of the next quarter. They’re designed for slightly younger teens, but she wants to release a few titles for an older crowd next year. You could sit in, perhaps help the developers plan their work after. I’ve told her that you would make a valuable resource, and there would be boys your age observing.”

Now that Lila knew that Dubois would never be a father, it was difficult to watch how easily he maneuvered Pax into leaving the house, into interacting with other boys his age. He would be—would have been—a great father. It seemed criminal for him to lose the chance at a child so early.

Senator Dubois’s loss was still on her mind as she trudged back upstairs.

Lila peeked inside her closet anxiously, but her uniforms still hung inside, just as she’d left them, the neat row of toy soldiers waiting for a battle that would never come. Erring on the side of caution, she took off her formal uniform and unpinned the remaining stars on her collar. She fished out one of the many informal uniforms, as well as another she wore for physical training, and folded them into a thick stack. Then she tucked the folded clothes and her blackcoat into her canvas bag and stuffed it into her secret compartment.

She had no more room for remembrances.

Lila sat in front of her desktop and pulled up the results of her search for the Baron. Her snoop programs had not found the ID anywhere, even after digging into all the dusty crooks of the net. As far Lila knew, the Baron did not exist, not until the snoop had slipped into BullNet and laid the first faltering trap. The Baron might have practiced stealing into Bullstow under a different ID, but she had no other ideas for how to find it.

Lila drummed her fingers upon her desktop. The only avenue she had left to explore was the Liberté bank account, the same account that connected Sergeant Davies to his latest bribe. Perhaps the account holder would lead her to Xavier Masson, a long-dead teen from the Masson family whose ID had been stolen by her blackmailer. The article the hacker had sent to her mother had been sent from it, leaving no trace of the culprit’s identity.

It was infuriatingly competent.

Lila pulled open the secret compartment once again, carefully donning her workborn clothes. She withdrew a laptop from a bottom drawer of her desk and loaded it into a satchel, then stuck a few star drives into her pocket.

Her fingers had already typed in Tristan’s ID on her palm before she realized what she was doing. Though he’d helped her the last time she hacked the Liberté, he wouldn’t help her again. He likely wouldn’t help her with anything anymore.