Taming the Wild Beast of Alamina-Chapter 151: Counterattack (2)

Sylvia lowered the phone and looked at him again.

"No," she said decisively. "This still looks too composed."

Nero, sprawled across half her couch like royal trouble in civilian territory, lifted a brow. "Too composed."

"Yes. It looks like two people with excellent posture made a responsible decision. That is not the tone we want."

"And what tone do we want?"

Sylvia gestured vaguely between them. "Something believable. Something that says this was unplanned, mildly chaotic, and comfortable enough to be annoying."

Nero considered that.

Then, before she could ask what that expression meant, he reached out.

Sylvia made a startled sound as one large hand caught her wrist and the other steadied her by the waist, and in one smooth movement Nero dragged her down onto the couch and into his arms with the effortless confidence of a man who could probably bench-press furniture for leisure.

She landed sideways across his lap.

The phone nearly slipped from her hand.

"Oh my God—"

"You said believable," Nero replied, far too calm for a man who had just rearranged her entire position like she weighed nothing.

Sylvia stared at him, then at the arm around her waist, then at the absurdity of her own life.

Nero’s white shirt was warm under her hand where she had braced herself against his chest. His other arm rested along the back of the couch, loose now, keeping her there without force because there was suddenly nowhere graceful to go anyway.

"This," Sylvia informed him, trying and failing not to laugh, "is an insane escalation."

"It’s convincing."

"It’s outrageous."

"It’s practical."

She turned her head to argue further and stopped.

Because there was, unfortunately, a streak of sauce near the corner of his mouth.

Sylvia stared.

Nero noticed. "What?"

She pointed. "You have sauce on your face."

He went still for half a beat. "Where?"

"That is not the important part."

"It seems important."

Sylvia looked at him - at the loose hair, the leather jacket tossed aside, the open collar, the massive arm around her waist, and the completely ridiculous smear of sauce somehow making the whole thing look worse in the best possible way - and then she lost it.

A laugh burst out of her before she could stop it.

Not polite amusement. Full, helpless laughter.

Nero looked faintly offended.

Sylvia bent forward with the phone still in her hand and fries clutched in the other, laughing hard enough that she nearly dropped both. "No, don’t move - don’t move; that actually makes it better."

"The sauce."

"Yes," she said through laughter. "The sauce. It makes you look human. Which, for this purpose, is ideal."

Nero’s expression flattened with princely dignity, but the corner of his mouth betrayed him.

Then he laughed too.

Low at first, brief, and disbelieving, like he couldn’t quite believe he was in a civilian apartment with a woman in his lap - no, correction, with her in his lap, laughing over hot wings and strategic emotional warfare while sauce compromised his face.

Sylvia heard it and looked up.

It changed him.

Not dramatically. He was still Nero, still beautiful in that unfair royal way, still dangerous around the edges. But laughter took ten years of tension off him in an instant. The room felt warmer for it.

"Oh, that’s terrible," Sylvia said, wiping at her eyes with the back of her hand. "You actually look happy. This is going to do irreversible damage."

Nero looked down at her, one hand still firm at her waist to keep her balanced, amusement now visible instead of hidden. "Take the picture, Sylvia."

She lifted the phone. "Wait. Don’t lose the sauce."

His eyes narrowed. "You are enjoying this too much."

"Yes." She angled the camera. "Because for once I’m not the most ridiculous person in the room."

"You’re sitting in a prince’s lap holding fries."

"And yet," she said, fighting another laugh, "you’re still winning."

She moved a little, settling more comfortably against him. It wasn’t exactly intimate, but it was close enough that anyone outside the room could see it that way. Nero adjusted without comment, his big hand spreading once at her side to steady her, the motion easy now, unforced. The takeout boxes littered the coffee table in front of them. Soda bottles. Open sauces. Perfect.

Sylvia lifted the fries into frame. "No, wait. This is art."

Nero looked at the screen. "That seems optimistic."

"Quiet. You’re decorative."

That got another laugh out of him, brief and real.

She snapped one photo.

Then another.

In the second one, Nero was looking at her instead of the phone, faintly smiling despite himself, sauce still at the corner of his mouth like evidence of recent bad decisions. Sylvia was turned halfway toward him, laughing openly, fries in hand, one knee tucked against the couch and the rest of her comfortably sprawled across his lap like she belonged there.

Sylvia stared at the result.

Then she slowly lowered the phone.

"Oh no," she said.

Nero looked down at her. "What?"

"This is good."

He took the phone from her hand and glanced at the screen.

Silence.

Then his mouth curved, small and sharp and deeply satisfied.

Sylvia pointed at him from where she still sat in his lap. "That expression means you’re about to commit a social crime."

"Minor," Nero said.

"That is not comforting."

He looked at the photo again. "Post this one."

Sylvia leaned over to inspect it with him. Her shoulder bumped his chest. "The second one?"

"Yes."

"Because you look beautiful and vaguely unavailable?"

"Because," Nero said, "it looks natural."

Sylvia turned her head and gave him a long look. "That is the most manipulative sentence you’ve said tonight."

"Thank you."

She barked another laugh.

Nero opened the private feed, the absurd aristocratic-security-social thing she had already judged on moral grounds, and uploaded the photo with the terrifying efficiency of a man who had clearly been raised around people weaponizing appearances long before he could legally drive.

Sylvia watched him type the caption.

She leaned in.

Then immediately groaned. "Oh, absolutely not."

Nero did not look up. "What?"

"You cannot just write ’better company.’"

His mouth twitched. "Why not?"

"Because that is exactly the sort of elegant, understated menace I warned you about."

"It’s concise."

"It’s devastating."

He posted it anyway.

Sylvia dropped her head back against his shoulder in despair. "You’re horrible."

Nero locked the phone and set it on the armrest beside them, then finally looked down at her properly again.

"You offered," he reminded her.

Sylvia lifted one fry like a tiny accusatory sword. "As a joke."

"And yet here you are."

She looked down at herself, still sprawled across his lap, one of his arms around her waist, the coffee table in front of them drowning in takeout, her own laughter still echoing in the apartment.

Then she looked back up at him.

"This is a terrible idea," she said.

Nero’s gaze flicked briefly to the phone.

"Yes," he agreed.

A beat passed.

Then Sylvia smiled slowly. "Good."

And because the entire situation had already collapsed beyond dignity, she reached up with her free hand, swiped the sauce from the corner of his mouth with one quick motion, and held up her fingers.

"Now," she said, "you at least look like a prince who finished his wings before emotionally destabilizing someone."

Nero laughed again, quietly, helplessly, and for real. Sylvia thought that whatever happened next, the picture had already done one good thing.