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“Oh, you poor thing,” she cooed. “You're like a baby unicorn—shiny and scared. That’s okay. I like a challenge.”

I wasn’t a challenge. I didn’t even want to be here!

Dear gods, strike me down. Or strike her down. Either would suffice.

I grabbed a roll from the bread basket, tearing into it viciously with my teeth. Even the perfect, fluffy consistency couldn’t quell my mood. Or the hot, rosemary butter inside.

It had to be a cruel joke on Juniper’s part, or possibly Lust. Yes, that was it. Lust was playing a joke on me, and Juniper was in on it. Lust had done things like this before, but pranks were usually more in Greed’s wheelhouse.

Still, it wasn’t unprecedented.

Yet...this tight feeling in my chest was new. It felt like an elephant on my chest, or worse–all five of my brothers at once.

With dawning horror, I realized I was fighting back tears.

Savagely I stuffed it all down, forcing a blank expression on my face. If Daphne noticed, she didn’t say anything or care. Her hand was cold as she tried to stroke mine, her perfume horrifically sweet; almost like rotting fruit as it tickled my nostrils.

I endured thirty-seven more minutes—yes,I counted—of suggestive fruit metaphors, nymph poetry that could only be described as ‘horny drivel,’ and at least two more accidental brushes of her foot against my calf, and a go at her hand in my crotch when she was ‘looking for the fork she dropped.’

Never mind we hadn’t even gotten our main courses yet.

Then I saw him.

Lust, leaning up against the doorway to our dining room, arms folded, expression amused.

Until he saw my face.

He blinked, and frowned, then crossed the room in a storm of silk and designer pants.

“Daphne,” he said smoothly, placing a hand on her shoulder, “I need to borrow Pride for a moment.”

She pouted. “But we need to order dessert after the main dish. I was gonna let him lick cake off my?—”

“Nope,” Lust interrupted, already pulling me from my chair.

I didn’t resist. Why would I? I still had my sin: my pride. Unfortunately.

He led me around the corner, to a quiet alcove lit with floating candles. He turned to me with a look I rarely saw on him.

Regret.

“You okay?” he asked simply.

I adjusted my cufflinks and cleared my throat. Lust had filled a caretaker role among us brothers, but it was always subtle, and certainly never this overt.

“Fine,” I coughed out.

Don’t fucking cry.

“Pride,” he chastised me.

“I thought it was a date,” I admitted after a beat. “With Juniper. I wore the ivory cravat,” I trailed off in a whisper, knowing how fucking pathetic I sounded.

I almost never wore the ivory cravat, for fear of getting it dirty.

“I know,” he said patiently. “She thought it’d be funny.” He hesitated for a beat before continuing. “And so did I, I must admit.”

“It wasn’t,” I argued vehemently.