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“Oh!”

Why was she saying, “Oh!” that way? Like she was both surprised and delighted by Warden Hallum?

“That’s not necessary,” she said, shaking her head. “It’s getting late, and I don’t want to drag them all out here now.”

“Plus, she needs her rest,” I cut in, annoyed that I had not yet been a part of the conversation thus far.

“Of course,” Warden Hallum said, his grey eyes flicking to the place my arm was pressed against Tasha’s. “I’ll bring out some food from the cellar. I have only one spare room with a cot in it, though.”

“That’s OK,” Tasha said, “we-”

“She can have it,” I growled. “I’ll sleep in the tent outside.”

I thought I felt Tasha’s eyes on me from the side then, but when I glanced her way, she was staring straight ahead, her smile looking oddly tight.

“Perfect,” she breathed. “Lead the way, Warden Hallum.”

Lead her, he did.

And I hated every blasted moment of it.

21

TASHA

Warden Hallum brought me inside his building, then showed me to a small, tidy room at the back.

“These will be your quarters,” he said, returning after a moment and handing me a plate of sliced meat and various fruits and vegetables he’d grabbed from his cellar.

“Thank you very much,” I said, taking the plate and putting it on the wooden bedside table. “It’s perfect.”

It really was a lovely room. Not a speck of dust to be seen. How was that possible? Every other room I’d been in on Zabria Prinar One so far had had dust. The stuff was everywhere.

Not here, apparently.

Even more impressive was that we’d arrived early, so he wouldn’t have had extra time to clean. Which meant Warden Hallum must have kept it this clean all the time.

“There is a basin there for washing,” he said, indicating a medium-sized bucket in the closet. “You can access clean water from the taps in the kitchen and any of the hoses attached to the outside of the house. The outhouse is directly beside the building.”

“I appreciate it.”

Warden Hallum lingered in the room with me, as if waiting to see if I had anything else to say. He stood perfectly still with his hands behind his back. His uniform was just as spotless as this room was. Despite the lack of conversation, he didn’t seem to register even a hint of awkwardness. Just stood there. Like a black-haired, grey-eyed statue. I glanced at my plate, then fidgeted a bit, picking at my fingernails.

This is the kind of guy who could break a man by doing nothing but staring at him in total silence.

I couldn’t think of a single thing to say. Warden Hallum was intimidating.

Tenn, when I’d first met him, had been intimidating, too. But for different reasons. He was intimidating because he’d shown himself to be so competent, so commanding, and so unfairly hot.

Warden Hallum also appeared to be competent, and commanding…

And cold.

Not that he wasn’t attractive. I’m sure some lady out there would have appreciated the cool, calculating quality of his steely grey eyes. That lady just wasn’t me.

I shivered.

Warden Hallum unexpectedly broke the silence.