Page 92 of Moonlight Hearts

“Mr.McArthur certainly knows what he’s talking about, so I wouldn’t argue.I suppose we lot are rather more boring than you, Laura.”

“Look, she taught Amory how to knit, Valentin,” Elias fake-whispered.“Behold the way his forehead warps when he attempts to concentrate.”

“Elias, I made sure you’d get your juice today,” I said while trying to keep another one of those little hoops from slipping off the needle.Why the knitting needles had to be that slippery, I didn’t know.

“I like juice!Can I have potato juice today, Amory?Please?”

Soyer walked up to us and handed Elias and Valentin a cup of cider each.“You mean you want vodka in your fucking fruit juice, young Hawthorne?”

“Bennet, I believe it’s de rigueur to rather keep your cursing to yourself in front of children these days,” Valentin said.

Soyer stood close behind me and put his warm hand at the nape of my neck.“I see.Sorry about that, Elias.My heart, I don’t know what you think this is, but a piece of knitting it is not.”

“I really tried, but he’s holding it weird,” Laura said.

Soyer nodded.“I can see that.”

I craned my neck back.“She did a good job teaching me.I guess I’m a bad student.You should probably compensate her for her time, at least.”

Soyer narrowed his eyes at Laura.“You definitely tried your best?”

“Yeah.I showed him how my sitter showed me.”

Soyer pretended to pat down his own pockets, then pulled out a bill.It was so obviously staged on his part that it simply warmed my heart.Soyer, without me realizing, had planned to be the doting fairy godparent to Laura somehow, and as far as I knew, they’d only met briefly.

He handed her the bill.“There you go, then.I apologize for not giving you a better student to practice your teaching on.”

“Oh!”Elias brightened.“I could be a student, couldn’t I, Valentin?”He looked at Simeon, who’d walked up, his own cup of cider already in hand.“Simeon, you always say I’m beyond teaching, but maybe it’s not me, maybe it’s you?Don’t you think I might be able to pick up knitting?”

Simeon tried to hide his smile as he and Valentin exchanged a look.

Valentin cleared his throat and looked at Laura.“Well, Miss Laura, would you be willing to attempt teaching Elias here?Should you succeed, I’ll double that pittance Bennet just paid you.”

“Why’d you call him Bennet?”

“For fondness.It’s the name his oldest friends use for him.”

She nodded, pondering this.“Fine.I need these back, sorry.”

My admittedly poor knitting efforts were taken from me, and Laura walked around the table to show Elias how it was done.

“Well, this should be interesting,” Soyer said.“I’ll go grab the vodka for the knitter.”

“Laura, you can sit here,” I told her, and gave up my chair to follow Soyer to get the juicer running and control the amount of vodka that was being distributed.

Chapter Twenty-Six

Soyerkeptsomeofthe hard liquor in the kitchen, but the vodka was in a storage room opposite the guest bedroom.I followed him back there.

“Are you having fun yet?”

He frowned at me as he opened a cabinet that didn’t really match his furniture and looked about a century old.For all I knew, it was.

“What makes you ask?”

I grinned at him.“I think you’re having fun.”

He sighed.“Believe what you will, my heart.Here.Vodka for your bestie.”He handed me the bottle.