A Tempest of Tea (Blood and Tea, #1)

by Hafsah Faizal

Arthie gave him a look. She wasn’t like him. She didn’t go around breaking hearts; she broke other things, like laws and contracts and bones.

As much as she’d love to see the Ram gone, Arthie preferred her method of chaos. She couldn’t blackmail someone she’d nixed. She couldn’t be a thorn in someone’s side if they no longer existed.

She was like the moon, she told herself. This emptiness was merely a phase she needed to traverse in order to be full again.

“You know, I’m not sure I like him,” Matteo said to Arthie. “If I needed to like everyone I worked with, I’d have to do everything myself,” Arthie said. “Hey!” Jin said. Arthie bit back a laugh.

She tilted her head and peered at him as if she were compiling his chapters into a book and something didn’t tally. As if he were broken, and only she could see it. But Jin was the one who fixed things. He knew what was broken, and it sure wasn’t him. It couldn’t be. Nope.

“You need to leave,” she whispered. “Before … before—” “No,” he whispered back. “Destroy me.”

“Stop punishing yourself by refusing to accept what you’ve become. Imagine your chaos, darling. Stop playing their games, and you can do so much worse.”

“Why save the world when you can have tea?”

“Felicity. You have some nerve returning after the way you spoke to me.” “I only spoke, Mother,” Flick said, which was the problem, she supposed.