Chapter 149

~~Jack~~

He left Harcourt with the monsters. Athalia said she wanted to talk to him, in private, and Harcourt agreed the same way a scared child might agree to something. But Jack knew the monsters wouldn’t hurt him, not while he was still under the Prince’s protection.

A part of Jack wanted to stick around, be a part of the conversation, maybe build some sort of bridge between him and Athalia, like she and his mom had. A much larger part of him knew he’d rage and snap, talking about Angela, and that wasn’t what Athalia needed. The woman needed closure, not an enemy. And as much as she’d nearly become one, Athalia wasn’t an enemy. Better to leave her be and let her recover without his interference. It wasn’t like Beatrice was going out of her way to talk to Athalia; far as he knew the two hadn’t talked to each other since she killed her daughter.

He wanted to fix things. It ate at him, like a fucking ant in his shoe, when he couldn’t fix something. The problems with the Invictus and Carthians, the problems with Begotten and Athalia, the problem with Mary being a ghost, and now the problem with his mom dating a bastard who might actually be trying to destroy the fucking world or something. The shit he would do for a magic wand, so he could just zap away and fix the problems.

“Jack,” Sándor said, “I wanted to talk to you.”

“Yeah, gathered that, from you coming with.” He kept the words light, playful, testing Sándor’s disposition.

The gargoyle didn’t so much as smile at the comment.

“And don’t worry. Harcourt will be fine.”

“I know.”

“I ... wanted to ask about Beatrice.”

Right, cause the man was a masochist and was determined to make himself feel even more guilty than Jack did about his mom. What a pair they were.

“Alright. Hit me.”

Sándor nodded. At least the two of them understood the value in being straight with each other, and not dancing around bushes.

“She and Julias. I understand they were a close couple. A bit of a ... two wayward souls finding solace in each other situation.”

Jack sighed. “Ah, you want to talk about Julias too.”

“Sorry. But—”

“It’s ok. We can skip the typical back and forths, the apologies and creeping on eggshells stuff. I’m guessing you’re sick of it.”

“Sick is a strong word. But ... I appreciate your candor.”

“Same. And yeah, Triss was your typical angry Nosferatu, and Julias was depressed with his second life. They really helped each other out. He helped her with her anger, she helped him find happiness again.” Jack put up his hands. “I’m quoting him, by the way. These are the things he told me. Though really it was the whole Circle that helped Triss get over her issues with her Nos deformities. They don’t care. Julias can’t take all the credit for that.”

“You were close with him.”

“Pretty close. Becoming a vampire put a strain on the relationship. But yeah, even when things got heated, we were still friends. Close friends. We talked to each other about almost everything, Triss included.” Ah fuck, that brought up the memory of the conversation in the hospital, the last normal conversation they had. “He was going to marry her; propose, anyway. She would have said yes.”

Sándor only barely flinched, but with this guy, that was essentially running him over with a train.

“Julias was ... You were there, at the end. I guess I don’t need to say how amazing he was.”

“No ... you don’t.”

Nodding, Sándor took a breath, pushing past the pain, same as Jack was.

“And Beatrice now?”

“We don’t talk as much as we used to. She’s probably doing some ritual shit that I’m happier not knowing about.” Jack looked Sándor’s way. If what he said meant something, Sándor didn’t react to it. “So, you want to know about Beatrice? She’s an angry punk on the outside, but on the inside she’s a normal girl, right down to fantasies of being a princess. When she was alive, she wasn’t anything special, just a really pretty, athletic girl who liked attention. Would be an instagram ass model if she was alive today.”

“Instagram ... ass model.”

Jack grinned at the man. Yeah, made sense Sándor wasn’t exactly up to date with online stuff.

“Internet, self made model, showing off her ass.”

“I see. She was that ... bold?”

“Ha! Vain is the word you’re looking for, dude. And before you defend her, she admitted it to me herself. She was a vain bitch when she was alive, and hey, if a girl wants to show off her ass for clicks and likes, or whatever they did back in 1990, by all means. But she got the attention of a stalker, a Nosferatu asshole. Course the Prince killed the fucker for siring without permission, but, yeah, waking up from death with a new set of big nasty teeth, that left her pretty angry. Down in the bones angry, you know?”

Sándor slowly nodded, eyes ahead and on the tunnel tracks. He knew. He probably knew better than anyone in the whole damn city.

“And Julias helped her overcome that?” he asked.

“Yeah. Julias was great at helping others. Not so good with helping himself.”

“Who is?”

“Good point.”

“And Beatrice. She’s taken to the Circle well?”

“Yeah, really well. I don’t trust Jacob, but I guess he called it right, getting her from the Carthians. And I guess I see it, now that she’s neck deep in it. Triss will make a good witch.”

“You didn’t think so before?”

“Nah. Before I knew her very well, I thought she was kinda like Jessy, loud and angry. But they’re nothing alike. Getting sired against her will really fucked her up, and that proud pretty girl she used to be shattered and turned into someone with a lot more rage and ... depth, I guess. Depth she probably didn’t want, but she got it anyway. Jessy isn’t like that. Deep as a plate. Awesome, in her own way, but yeah.”

That managed to get at least a small smile out of the gargoyle.

“That’s good.”

“What, that Triss has depth? Why? You kinda gave me the impression Jen’s attempts to seduce you with TNA was a failure.” Jack put up a hand again before Sándor could ask. “Tits and ass.”

“I see. I ... guess I am interested in Beatrice, yes. We’ve talked, and she’s intriguing.”

“Don’t mind the crocodile teeth?” Jack pointed at his cheeks.

“No.” A complete lack of explanation. Typical. But it made sense. Dude was a Begotten, and probably met a lot of monsters who looked fucking horrible. Just another day for a nightmare creature.

“Well, from what I can tell, Beatrice and Jennifer are best friends, and friends with benefits. If you want one, you get the other. Which, I mean, Jen’s ridiculously hot, so I imagine most guys would be happy with that arrangement. But something tells me you’re more of a vanilla guy?”

Even wording it like that, hoping to poke the guy’s ego a bit and crack his shell, got nothing. Pure deadpan face.

“My life with my wife was ... not vanilla.” Jack’s words didn’t crack Sándor’s shell, but his own did, for a split second at least. He flinched, just barely. Interesting.

Jack chuckled. It felt good to laugh, after everything he’d been through lately.

“If you want to ask her out or something, I say go for it. Just ... just be careful. Julias’s been dead for a while, but not so long it doesn’t still sting.”

“I’m not sure dating is what I had in mind.”

Not sure? Dude had something in mind.

“Triss is awesome, but probably a little fragile right now. Julias was her pillar, you know? She leaned on him, and she isn’t the sort of girl to do that lightly.”

“I hear a lot of people relied on Julias.”

“Yeah, that’s true. He was a Right Hand of the Invictus before I was, and the Invictus relied on him heavily. Then his sire died, and Julias replaced him on the council. Everyone was happy about it, cause yeah, people trusted Julias to not only do his due diligence, but he also didn’t have ulterior motives. Usually. Of all the Kindred in the city, he was the only damn one you could trust to not screw you over.”

Sándor nodded as he took it in. “Dolareido is worse for his passing.”

“Yeah, it is.” Jack almost launched into a ‘it’s not your fault’ speech, but Sándor had made it clear he didn’t want to hear it. And Jack was happy to oblige. “I’m not entirely sure what you’re aiming to do, Sándor, but there’s no way you can replace Azamel, be a protector and teacher for all the younger Begotten, and simultaneously replace Julias, you know? If anything, replacing him is my job.”

“You’re a little busy to replace him, don’t you think?”

“I guess.” The turf war was definitely something Julias would have handled, and better than Jack was, but the shit with the tears, Black Blood, and potentially Jacob, was a twist he doubted his sire would know how to handle any better than he did.

“And I suppose I’m not looking to replace your sire. But I am looking to heal the wound as best I can.”

“So you can fix things.”

“Yes. I have to fix things. Even if they’re not my fault, they’re still my responsibility. I ... have to fix what I can.”

Jack smiled at him. “I know the feeling.”

It’d be sunrise soon. A bit over an hour. Tomorrow night he’d pay Antoinette a visit, and see what they could do about ... about everything. In the mean time, he had one other thing to check up on, one other thing he was trying to fix.

He stepped into his old house, his mom’s old house, and let the darkness and cold envelop him. The house was officially haunted, and all those old movies made a lot more sense. Haunted houses weren’t just creepy, they had an aura. You felt death when you entered them, in a way only a ghost could cause. Unnatural death.

“Mary, you here?” He took off his shoes and set them beside the side door on the mat. Habit. The side door took him into the kitchen, and he walked through it as he looked around. “Mary?” She usually hung out in her room upstairs, but no reason to not ask out loud for her before he got there.

Sure enough, no response. But the place felt cold, weird and in the bones cold, and that seemed to be an indicator she was around. So he headed upstairs, and knocked on her door.

“Mary, you there? I’m coming in.” The memory slapped him in the face. He’d said those exact words before, when he was young and she was still alive.

He stepped into her room, and the cold bit into him like knives. Not real cold. A vampire didn’t really give a shit about temperatures outside of absurd extremes, but something about being around a ghost made that defense moot. It was painful cold in Mary’s room, and mist flowed over the floor up to his knees.

Course all that was forgotten the moment he saw his sister sitting on the edge of her bed, looking through a photo album. It sat beside her, not on her lap like Jack figured she’d hold it. Then again, ghost.

“Hey Mary. You uh, learned how to touch stuff?”

She shook her head. “Mom helped me with this. It’s ... it’s taken a lot of time and effort, but I can turn the pages. Barely.”

“Anything else? Open drawers or anything?”

“No. Not without either doing nothing, or throwing it across the room.”

Nodding, he came over and sat beside her, picture album between them. “Been talking to Mom lately? Guess you have, if she put this together for you.” Looked like a new photo album, a big one, and full of pictures his mom and Mary had taken. Even his dad was in there. The memories of the Terry family in one place.

“Yeah. She’s happy!” The ghost opened her eyes wide as she snapped her head up, the motion a blur. Jack almost jumped back. Those empty eyes. “I’m glad. Mom should be happy. It’s been so hard on her.”

“Hard on you too, Mary.”

“You’re right, you’re right. But I’m dead, and ... and that’s ok. Mom has you now, right? And that Jacob man.”

Fuck Jacob.

“Yeah, I guess she does. Not really a fan of Jacob, personally.”

“Would you be a fan of any man Mom dates?” Well, Mary was being surprisingly clear and articulate. He didn’t know if that was a good thing, or a bad thing.

“I guess not. But Jacob is a dangerous guy, scary dangerous, and—”

“Mom says a lot of vampires say that about you.”

Fuck. “I’ll fix that.”

“You can’t fix everything, Jack.”

“I can try.”

She laughed. A little too shrill to sound nice, but it was a lot better than angry Mary throwing him around with telekinesis and whatnot.

“Mom’s been pretty shy about it, but I think she’s getting laid, too.”

Ugh, he wasn’t old enough for this conversation. The idea his mom had to have sex, twice, to have two children still irked him. Give him another ten years and maybe he’d be able to think about it without cringing, but not yet. Mary definitely had a one up on him in that aspect of maturity.

“I guess she is.”

“Some pretty nasty, kinky sex, too.”

“What? Oh come on, Mom doesn’t tell you about that stuff.”

Mary grinned at him. Spooky. “She does, at least a little. And it’s not hard to guess what she means when she says something else. You know Mom, and how much she likes to undersell.”

“I guess.”

“Which means Mom is enjoying some pretty big sex fantasies. Like, orgies and stuff.”

Jack plugged both his ears. “La la la la la la.”

Laughing, Mary swung out to bat away one of his arms. But her hand past through it, sending a harsh jolt of cold up into his shoulder. Somehow, he managed to not yelp, but it wasn’t enough to stop her from dropping her empty eyes. He got ready to jump out of the way if she flipped out and decided to throw the bed or something, but she only sighed, and turned the page of the photo album. It took her a few tries, fingers passing through it again and again, but she managed.

Jack lowered his hands, and looked down at the pictures as well. Better to ignore how fucked up the situation was, that Mary was dead and couldn’t touch anything. Hell, with Beatrice doing crazy ritual stuff and flirting with Death herself, maybe she’d help his mom and Mary out? Which would undoubtedly end horribly, and probably make everything worse.

“I remember this picture,” he said. “Banana Bananza Waterpark.” Samantha, James, Mary, and Jack. Jack was a scrawny little kid, pasty white, and shivering. Water cooled him down a little too well.

Mary nodded, and pointed to the picture beside it. “There’s us when we went camping.”

“You hated it.”

“You were supposed to hate it, too. Didn’t think my nerd brother would like climbing trees.”

“I was ten. It’s a boy thing. Climbing or digging snow forts.”

Her smile returned, and she flipped to the next page. No need to describe any of these pictures, they both knew what they were. The last birthday Jack had when his dad was still alive.

“I’m happy Mom’s happy,” she said. “Every time she visits, or every time I...” Her fingers paused over a picture of their mom, her hugging their dad’s arm and smiling for the camera. “It hurts, seeing her hold onto me so tight.”

“I thought you didn’t want to ... you know...” Die. Leave. Pass on. Cross over.

“I don’t know!” She snapped her head up again, empty eyes wide, but Jack didn’t react this time. “I can feel something in me, and it wants to latch onto ... onto anything. But I’m scared of the dark places I can see! That place where that ... that thing comes from.”

“Black Blood?”

“I think so. I told Mom, but she’s...” Mary sighed and shrugged. “I don’t know. Something’s going on, and I don’t know!”

“Me neither. But I’m working on it, and so are a bunch of vampires. Mom’s sire, she’s—”

“Your girlfriend?”

Jack turned away. “We got in a fight.”

“Bad?”

“Pretty bad.”

“Don’t let her go, Jack. She’s good for you.”

“How do you know? What’s Mom been telling you?”

Mary smiled as she turned the page. “That Antoinette’s super smart, and assertive. Two good things for you, I think.”

“Oh?”

“Yeah. I think a more normal girl would probably bore you after a while, you know?”

Clara wouldn’t bore him. Would she?

“Well, that super smart, assertive part of her is part of why we’re in a fight.”

“Fights can be ended, you know? You can fix them and—” Her head twitched, fast enough it left a hazy afterimage that it snapped back into after a moment. “Sorry. It’s hard to ... to keep thinking.”

“Antoinette and other people are working on this weird thing with tears, the things you’re seeing. We’ll get it figured out, and then you can ... I don’t know. What do you want to do?”

“I don’t know either.” Slowly, Mary closed the book, and her body shimmered, like flickering TV static as she struggled with it. “I got a visit from that other ghost again.”

“Oh shit. Sabrina?”

“Yeah. She wants to get in. But you said to stay away from her, so I won’t let her.”

“Good! Good. Christ she was a scary fucking ghost. She’s dangerous, and not just for me, but you too.”

“I’m safe here. It’s my home. She can’t get in.”

The fact Sabrina was roaming around, not tied down like Mary was, was god damn fucking terrifying. The last thing Jack needed was that psychopath ghost learning Jack killed her master.

“Alright. I’ll go now.” He got up, but she got up with him, and floated in front of him, blocking him off from the door.

“Jack, I ... I don’t know what I’m going to do. M-Maybe, if things change in the future, I’ll go. Maybe if ... if things go differently, who knows. I know I can’t stay here forever. I’m ... I’m lucid now, but I know I’m not always like that. Something has to change.”

He couldn’t look her in her empty eye sockets, not from this close, not with what she was saying. Not with what he knew Triss was doing.

“I know.”

“But whatever happens, you can’t die, ok? Mom won’t be able to handle it. I don’t care what happens. I don’t care who you have to fight, or ... or kill. I don’t care what enemies you make. Don’t die, ok? It’s the best thing you can do for Mom.”

Don’t die. Just don’t die. Honestly, with the curse poisoning everything, him dying wasn’t what he was worried about. It was him killing everyone else.

The memory of Maria’s nightmare echoed in his mind, like a speaker shrieking with feedback, until he thought his ears would bleed.

~~Antoinette~~

Once upon a time, in an age long past, Antoinette had given up on the idea of love. The very thought of sharing true intimacy, physical, intellectual, and emotional, with another Kindred was a silly, juvenile thought, something most elders had given up on. And while Antoinette often avoided meetings with the Ordo, as she much preferred to work on her projects without interference, she had met plenty of elder Kindred deep in the recesses of the organization who had also given up on romance. The elder mind struggled to think in such terms.

Jack. Silly yet mature, cynical yet optimistic, logical yet emotional Jack, had dug up a part of her she had long thought dead, and she would not give it up easily, especially not for some plebeian mongrel. Jack was hers. If she had to kill Clara to keep it that way, she would. Illogical as it was and likely to doom the relationship, she would.

But seeing the damn woman walk the street, alone, struggling to not sob even as tears ran down her cheeks, ripped a hole clear through the bubbling anger in Antoinette’s chest. Why? The damnable woman was her enemy, and all was fair in love and war.

And yet, something about seeing the werewolf struggle with her sadness as she walked the street pulled at something inside Antoinette. For the life of her, she did not know what, or why, but she released her Cloak, and walked toward Clara.

“Wha—shit!” Clara jumped back as she stared at the Prince. “The fuck? What are you ... oh shit.”

Sighing, Antoinette held up a hand and shook her head. “Peace, Miss Moreno.”

“Peace? Why are you even here? You—”

“I saw you, entering Jack’s apartment. I saw you leave Jack’s apartment, a while later.”

Clara’s eyes widened, and she took another step back. “You came here to kill me, over that? You ... fucking psycho.”

Antoinette ground her teeth as she glared at the woman. “I came to parlay.”

“I don’t believe that for a second.” With a sniffle, Clara wiped her nose with her wrist, her eyes with her fingers, and took another step back. “And don’t think I’ll go down without a—”

“Clara Moreno, cease your incessant prattling! I am not here to kill you.” Though with the way Clara insisted the conversation go, she was making it increasingly easy to return to that plan. “I am here to talk ... about whatever happened tonight.”

“Yeah, go fuck yourself. I—” She spun around, hand out, and the back of her hand collided with air.

Elaine stepped back from the backhand, wearing a toying grin as her Cloak faded, and idly rubbing her cheek where Clara had hit her. “Impressive.”

“Two elders for one wolf? You two really that scared?”

“Of course not.” Sighing louder, full dramatic effect intended, Antoinette waved Elaine off, and her old friend stepped around Clara to join her again. “Forgive the Ventrue her ... mischievous ways. I wish to speak to you Clara, about Jack.”

“I didn’t fuck him, calm down.”

“I gathered.”

“Ha, how? Cause I’m crying?”

“By the time frame. Half an hour? Please.” A small attempt at a joke, to lighten the mood. She had indeed thought, for a furious moment, that perhaps Clara had seduced her little Jack. That idea had shattered upon seeing the woman’s tears, and now Antoinette did her best to recover the situation. It earned a surprised, raised brow from the woman, and Antoinette could not help but mirror Elaine’s domineering grin. But she suppressed it quick enough, and took another step toward Clara. “If I wanted to kill you, Clara, I could have arranged it, easily. No need to dirty my hands.”

“Unless you wanted to bloody them. You come across as a cold bitch, but I’ve seen more than a few vamps just like you. When shit gets personal, you freak the fuck out and get vicious.”

Antoinette glared at the woman, and a small part of her hoped the stupid creature would shatter into a hundred shards of frozen blood and gore, there on the street.

“I admit that, perhaps, I originally wanted a rather terse word.”

“Terse? Gimme a break.”

“I swear you will not be harmed, Clara. But I do wish to speak.” She almost worded it as an order, but she knew Clara, like any of the Uratha in Avery’s pack, would respond to even the most logical order with resistance. Better to ask, and save herself the headache. “Please.”

Clara eyed her suspiciously, but after another sniffle, shrugged and nodded. “Fuck it, fine. The fuck do I have to lose.”

“Bloodlust? Really?” No doubt the woman felt self conscious about her clothes.

“It is a secure location. We may speak privately.” Antoinette nodded to the bouncer at the door, and walked toward the side staircase. Kine ceased chatting to stare at the tall white-haired woman in the business suit, before their eyes fell to the tall blonde in a similar suit, and then eventually to the tan-skinned woman with box-braid hair, wearing a t-shirt and jeans. The kine knew better than to interfere.

Soon, Antoinette sat upstairs in her usual booth, far in the back. Elaine did not join them however, nodding before departing to find another booth. On the hunt, no doubt.

Clara eventually sat down across from Antoinette in the large, circular booth, eyes locked on Antoinette. Her tears had stopped, though Antoinette could see she was holding them back to save face. Such a child.

“I assume Jack has told you about the situation with Black Blood, and my order about Samantha.”

“You’re lucky he did. I was thinking about dropping by and giving Samantha a check-in, see if she’d put some distance between her and that asshole Jacob. At least I was until Jack said you told him to not tell her about the situation.”

“You disagree.”

“Course I fucking disagree. She’s your childe, isn’t she? The fuck—”

Antoinette held up a hand. “I did not invite you here to speak of Samantha. Know that if you warn her, I will consider that an act against me. And not a personal attack, but an official one, orchestrated by your pack.” She leaned in and glared daggers into the wolf. “Respect that you are guests in my city. Do not make me remove you.”

For all Clara’s bravado, for all her strength and rank as second-in-command of her pack, Clara was a gnat compared to Antoinette’s power. The wolf tried to hold Antoinette’s gaze, but failed, and looked down and away after several seconds.

“No idea what Jack sees in a bitch like you.”

Well, if the woman had no issue making this as personal as possible, Antoinette would stoop to her level.

“No doubt you assume the only thing he sees in a vampire comme moi, is the size of my breasts.”

Clara snorted as she finally regained her confidence, enough to glare at Antoinette at least. “I think you’ve got the whole ancient seductress thing down pat, yeah. I think you’ve got Jack all twisted up inside, so he can’t think straight when he’s around you.”

Not entirely an unwarranted opinion. Antoinette had indeed gone out of her way to become a seductress, physically and intellectually, even resorting to strange, forgotten measures to ensure her unusual body. To an outside eye like Clara, Antoinette’s actions must have seemed terribly shallow. But Clara was a young fool who did not understand her own heart, her own desires, or the reality in pursuing them. Antoinette took no more offense in her ignorant views about the Prince’s body than she would if a four-year-old child had insulted her shoes.

“We discussed my relationship with Jack once before. You thought I was selfish, that I was putting my desires before what was healthy for him.”

“I still think that.”

“Even after what Jack has told you, about my order about his mother?”

A hole in Clara’s opinion, that Antoinette would risk Jack’s anger instead of tricking him. Naturally, the werewolf sneered and looked away again as she realized it.

“You probably think he’ll come back to you like a dog on a leash, coming back to its master no matter how many times the master beats it.”

It took more effort than Antoinette wanted to admit, to not reach across the table and tear the damn woman’s eyes out.

“He will come back to me, because we love each other, Clara. And while he and I are quite different, and it is through those differences that we have found synergy.”

“You know all that shit about two opposites attract is just that, shit, right?”

Antoinette found herself smiling. “Oh?”

“You think Uratha can’t read about things? Fuck you. Yeah, I read stuff sometimes, and what do you know, turns out that shit about opposites attract is just romanticizing. You need to have common ground, or it’s a doomed relationship.” Well well, the woman was smarter than she seemed.

“And you think Jack and I have no common ground? That we are opposites? Surely he has told you otherwise.”

She turned to her other side, now facing out toward the club and the other booths closer to the stairs and railing. “So he says. I can’t see how a young guy can really have common ground with an ancient bitch.”

“Then you do not understand Jack at all.”

That earned a surprised glance from Clara, before she leaned back, folded her arms across her chest, and glared at Antoinette. “Enlighten me, then.”

“That is why we are here ... partly.”

“Partly?”

“Later. For now, let us speak of Jack then. You think Jack is a young man, a silly boy thrust into circumstances that have hardened him, and sculpted a man. Oui?”

“I guess, yeah. Dude was what, twenty, when he was embraced? That wasn’t even four years ago. He’s grown up into a pretty awesome guy.”

“Clara, I was attracted to Jack long before any of the events that molded him befell him. If anything, I have worked to undo the effects those traumatizing moments have had on him.”

“Uh huh.”

“I do not lie. The first time I met Jack, I thought him nothing more than an unusual choice for Julias Mire, nothing like him at all. I met the boy later at Bloodlust, in this very booth, and he displayed unusual courage, and unusual wisdom.” Clara did not need to know the details of that conversation. Jack, a young man with utterly no world experience, had remarked that Antoinette was lonely, even as the boy trembled beside her in fear. “I was attracted to him when he was ... unknown, when he was simply a young man with a mind that did not fit such a simple description.” Antoinette leaned over the table toward the wolf woman. “Jack is an old soul, Clara.”

“Old soul? And if I don’t believe in reincarnation?”

“Metaphor. Jack is not a young man, or rather, not young in many regards. Surely you have noticed that.”

“I have. Kid’s definitely got an inner grumpy asshole.”

“Quaint. Oui, there are aspects to Jack that allow him and I to communicate in meaningful, deep ways. I am sorry if that offends you”—though they both knew very well that she was not—”but in truth, Jack is not the sort of man you could spend the rest of your life with, Clara.”