Pretty Little Lion by Suleikha Snyder
25
Grace’s plate was heaped with chivo guisado and mangú and rice and the patatas bravas Meghna had brought in while Elijah hemmed and hawed about not having time to cook. The fragrant stew and plantains were pure comfort. So were the spiced potatoes. Like her mama’s greens and her ba’s spicy Chinese dishes. When Joaquin made them gather like they were family, not coworkers, she almost felt like what they were pushing for was true. This was her family. These were her people.
She’d tried, the first few years at Queensboro Community, to join in the culture there. But they’d all been so suspicious, so resentful, of the Asian excellence and Black Girl Magic she’d cultivated in order to win her spot there. Ice Queen, Bitch Princess…all the nicknames that had plagued her in medical school came back with a vengeance. And then she’d realized that she could work somewhere else without having to dispel those myths. Third Shift. Sure, she still had hurdles. Like anyone who wasn’t white and male. She was still a Black woman. Still Asian. Still struggling to teach the people around her that she wasn’t their mother or their maid. Still hating that she had to teach at all.
Grace nudged Finian with her knee. She knocked Nathaniel with her empty beer bottle. I’m here. She’d always had a good sense of self. You had to, when you grew up in America not looking like the people they’d etched on the charter. She was unapologetically Black. So proud to be Chinese. But she still felt like she was fighting to be seen. The snark about being Snow White was…unlike her. A thing she’d normally have kept to herself. But having Finn and Nate flanking her, with all of that warmth, had made her drop her usual defenses. So much about Finn and Nate made her drop her usual defenses.
Her security doors opened up so thoroughly that the words “I’m quitting” escaped her lips before she could stop them, surprising her as much as everybody else. Forks and spoons and plates clattered. At least a few glasses slipped from grips. Only Elijah’s quick reflexes and Jack’s magic kept red wine from spilling all over Joaquin’s flat-woven rugs. Exclamations of “What?” and “Why?” flew fast and furious even as Grace struggled to clarify. “No! Calm down, everybody!” she said as she worked it out herself. “I’m not quitting here. I’m leaving Queensboro Community.”
She was? Yes. She was. The impulsive words solidified into something tangible that grew in her chest. She’d been punching a clock at the hospital for years. Barely that in recent months, as more assignments for 3S took up her time. It was a chore to go in. She did her procedures on autopilot, relying on her rote skills instead of what had once been a passion, a challenge. Tavi’s scheming to get her called in front of the board had only made clear how little she actually cared about being there. Having her contract terminated, getting suspended, would not have been the end of her world.
The end of her world and the beginning of it were in this room. So was her passion. So was her commitment. It was time to stop pretending Third Shift was her side gig. It never had been. Not in her heart and not in her head.
“I want to be a full-time operative,” she said once the cacophony had settled and Finian stopped looking so much like he needed an emergency transfusion. “I want to be here, where I’m needed…and not just because I’m the only woman on the American side. Because that’s not the case now, is it? We have Neha. And Yulia. And Meghna.”
Yulia and Meghna both blinked at that but, to their credit, didn’t vocally disagree. Whether they wanted to interrogate it or not, whether it was temporary or not, they were part of 3S now. Yulia by marriage and also by everything that happened with her brother, Aleksei Vasiliev, barely a month before. Meghna because she’d partnered with Elijah in more ways than one. They were witnesses to 3S’s inner workings, emotionally invested in its members. And they meant she was no longer alone.
Grace swung her attention back to Elijah and Jackson. To her bosses and men she considered friends—but not at the expense of herself and her worth. “I want you all to value me for what I actually bring to the table. How I save your asses on a regular basis. And I’d like to go on more away missions, more extended ops. No more desk duty and waiting at home with the first aid kit.”
“Sod it all, Grace. Why didn’t you say something before?” Elijah’s growl reverberated across the room. “You do save our arses on the regular, and if we haven’t made you feel valued for it, that’s on us. That’s what that Snow White business was about, wasn’t it?”
Score one for the lion shifter. Grace shrugged, leaning forward to place her empty drink on the coffee table. “Draw your own conclusions, Lije. I’m just saying how I feel. What I want. What I deserve.”
And she wasn’t done with that. She shifted her body just slightly, sinking back into the couch cushions so the men on either side of her were her focus. “I want this, too,” she told them quietly. “I want to see where it goes. I want it to last. I want promises. And feelings—not just pants feelings,” she added before Finn could make the obvious and expected joke.
He winced. “I haven’t been making you feel valued either, have I, Gracie?” he murmured. It would have been for her ears only had they not been in a room full of shape-shifters and spies. Most of whom were now politely pretending to drink and chat and finish their food.
“I know who you are, Finn. I’ve never expected anything from you,” she assured him. “I didn’t need to. But then last month…in that damn warehouse…I felt you bleeding out under my hands. Again. It changed everything. I didn’t want it to, but it did.”
“It changed things for all of us,” Nate said, the gentle weight of his body pressing along her side. “It woke me up.”
“It had you running scared,” Finn corrected. “If Grace hadn’t called you, you wouldn’t even be here right now.”
“But I am here,” Nate countered, ever the lawyer. “And I’m not going anywhere.”
Good.That was all Grace wanted, really. Her job, her life, her men…some semblance of permanence. And to come first for once. To be the one cared for and cherished, instead of the one always doing the caring. She deserved that. She deserved this. And she wasn’t ever letting it go.
* * *
Meghna knew what Elijah was trying to do with this dinner. It was about as subtle as a brick to the head. Making her feel welcome. Making her feel like a part of something. Showing her that she didn’t have to fight alone. Third Shift and its people were as opposite to the Vidrohi as inhumanly possible. They counted on their bonds, on their mutual commitment to their goals, to help them. She’d been taught that self-reliance was the only way to keep everyone in the network safe. And yet…here she was. Being included, assumed a compatriot and colleague, all because she’d come in with Elijah a handful of days ago. Third Shift was either the biggest bunch of trusting fools to walk the planet or a crew of total geniuses.
They were definitely fantastic cooks. Her hastily compiled patatas bravas from the tinned potatoes and tomatoes made a decent showing but couldn’t possibly compare to the table that Joaquin had laid. If only fighting fascism involved the best possible combination of spices, they’d have long since conquered it already. She’d grown up in a house with servants who’d come with her father from Uttar Pradesh. Ramu Chacha, their driver. Uma Auntie, the housekeeper. Thakur, the cook, who’d snuck her sweets and treats whenever she visited the kitchen. She’d taken them all for granted, taken Thakur’s skill for granted. And she herself had only learned to navigate the culinary arts later in life. As an adult. For Instagram more than anything else. Surely not personal enjoyment. Surely not because she missed the heat of coriander and ginger and green chilies on her tongue.
Good food made you feel things. Meghna hadn’t really felt anything for years. Now she couldn’t seem to stop. Anger. Fear. Lust. Affection. Hunger. Joy. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d laughed so freely.
“You’re having fun. Admit it.” Elijah nudged her companionably, his brown eyes sparkling. This was the man that women succumbed to in clubs and bars, if that was even a thing he did. The beautifully charismatic flirt with the rich hot-chocolate laugh.
“I’ll admit it. But it still feels…wrong somehow.” To be smiling, to be warm and well fed, when so many people in the world were suffering. Had she convinced herself that being miserable, cool, and aloof amid all her wealth and privilege somehow made it okay? How was that any better? Meghna gripped her thrice-filled pisco glass with both hands. “Do you always do this?” she wondered. “Party before you might die?”
“Not always. But it’s a good reminder of what we might die for, love. For our friends. For our families. For the freedom to be who we are without fear.” He huffed out a breath. Serious once more. So passionate in his convictions that it took her own breath away. He found the tendrils of hair falling along the right side of her face and wound them around his fingers, tugging gently. “We don’t do it to be macabre, Meghna. We do it because it gives us hope. And it gives us fuel.”
Fuel she understood. Cold vengeance for the wrongs perpetuated against the world’s most vulnerable had been fueling her for decades. But hope? Hope was something she’d wiped out of her lexicon. Until Elijah Richter had given her that come-hither look across the VIP lounge at the Manhattan Grand and tripped all her internal alarms. “I should fuck him,” she’d concluded, though that was the most ridiculous of conclusions if one was trying to be practical. You wanted to fuck him, the judgmental voices at the back of her mind corrected. You wanted him from the first second you saw him. How could anyone with a sex drive not feel the same? Elijah was perfect. Dark-brown skin and dark-brown eyes and muscles and smiles. Her palms itched even now to wrap around his locs and tug. To guide his face between her thighs. If she was going to die tomorrow, she wanted Elijah to lick her, to fuck her, one last time.
“Be my fuel,” she told him softly, leaning forward to move her empty plate from her lap to the coffee table. “Show me what we’re fighting for.”
“Oh, Meg. I already have.” He gestured with his bottle of beer before setting it aside. “But I’ll do it again. And again. Until you see what the rest of us see.”
“What’s that?” she wondered, though she half suspected the answer.
“This.” And operatives and underlings be damned, he leaned forward and captured her mouth with his. Regardless of the food and alcohol they’d consumed. The fact that she tasted as much of garlic as she did of Peruvian liquor. Elijah Richter didn’t care. This was a lion king claiming his partner before his pride. This was him speaking to her in the most basic, primal language on earth. With a kiss that overtook her, overcame her, consumed her. It poured honey and rosewater through her veins. Popped peppercorns and tamarind on her tongue. His palm on her neck was so warm and steady. Steadier than her pulse. If Meghna leaned into this man, if she breathed in his power, she would never lack for support.
Loving Elijah Richter back would be the easiest mission she’d ever undertaken. And the most challenging. Because love was the biggest risk in the world. The payoff was as big as the loss. She’d half-assed it with Chase. Not love so much as infatuation, helped along by copious amounts of designer drugs. Falling for Elijah was sober and clear. No substances in play. Just her. Just what she wanted.
Meghna couldn’t recall the last time she’d gone after something she wanted for herself. Amassing things? Sure. She’d had the wealth and the connections for Birkin bags or Louboutins. All parts of her costume, her cover. But going after what filled her emotional well? Never. Because she’d internalized the lesson that wanting was selfish, destructive. Elijah was trying to show her that wanting was life. But all she could feel was to acknowledge that wanting was dangerous. It was heady and seductive beyond the apsara’s duty and skills. This was why the old Hindu myths and legends warned against falling in love. Why they painted apsaras as selfish sluts who left their babies behind to be raised by mortals while they returned to the heavens. Why Draupadi’s preference for Arjuna over her other four husbands was her secret sin and her lust for the warrior Karna even more forbidden. Because caring too much was a weakness. Attachment a vulnerability that targeted more than just mother and child. And yet these were the same stories that praised women like Savitri, who faced down Yama, the god of death himself, to bring her husband back to life. Vice versus virtue. Sinner versus saint. The virgin-whore dichotomy had been in play for thousands of years. Pitting women against one another. Pitting women against themselves.
Meghna wasn’t even sure she was capable of love, but Elijah made her want to try. To dive from the plane without a parachute and just fall. For now, she would fall with him into his bed. Capture what could be their last hours together and hold them tightly. Joaquin and the others let them leave to do just that with obligatory commentary. A bit of good-natured ribbing. Warnings from Finn to “Beware of chafing!” The elevator seemed to reach Elijah’s floor in a blink. Their shoes and clothing came off just as quickly.
“You’re a good man,” she whispered against his lips when they stopped just inside his bedroom doorway. A sentiment she’d put forth already but that bore repeating. “Too good be true.”
“You haven’t been listening to me at all, have you? Goodness isn’t a lie, Meg.” His fingertips skated down the curve of her cheek, leaving behind a trail of fire. His other hand had a good grip on her ass, and he gave it an emphatic squeeze. “It’s a choice. You can make that choice for yourself. For your heart. And stop seeing yourself as the villain.”
I don’t see myself as the villain, she wanted to protest. But winding her legs around his waist and grinding against the rise in his jeans seemed like a more important task. Kissing him silent was far more vital. And living to the fullest until tomorrow was all that mattered.