Extra Ordinary (Riddle Era)

Chapter 37

Tom's smile was a slow spreading thing, a spilling of some noxious liquid that had finally bubbled over in his chest. "If you're not hiding from your father, Lucy, darling," he said softly, sweetly, reveling in the look on her face, in the victory he could already taste, in the sound of snapping her he could already imagine. "Then why don't you talk about him?" He paused, studying her, watching the way she broke his gaze, looked away. The way there was something small and... almost shameful in her face. He almost laughed at that. Shame was for fools and ordinary men. It was almost a pity to see it on her face. Almost.

"It's not him you're afraid of, is it?" he asked, his smile pulling wider, hardly believing his luck, her weakness.

She inhaled deeply, the sound an attempt at steadying. "I don't know what you mean," she said, but the words shook just a touch, her gaze couldn't hold his and her jaw was clenched so tight it could only be to keep it from wobbling.

Tom tipped his head to the side, felt a touch of pity slip into his smile. "Come now, Lucy," he chided. "Let's look at the facts. You like to avoid speaking about your father, but when you finally do, you like to make him distant, don't you? You like to make him seem like a character. A figment out of a story. Like you don't really care. Like he's not quite real. And why, Lucy? Why avoid the mere mention of his name if you care so little what he was?" He let the question sit, just a beat, just long enough to make her look at him because Merlin, he wanted her to look at him. Wanted to see it in her face. Wanted to taste her fear, revel in the knowledge that they both knew what came next. He wanted to see her powerless for once before he delivered the blow.

He was disappointed.

Even with her jaw clenched, even with her arms wrapped around herself like armor, even with fear in her face, she met his gaze with something determined in her own.

He narrowed his eyes. And pressed on.

"Could it be," he asked softly, fighting to keep the saccharine note in his tone even as it threatened to slip towards something simply angry, "that sweet, calm, peaceful little Lucy, is angry?" The last word came out through clenched teeth, it's sound almost a mirror, tangled up as it was in Tom's own annoyance. His own hopes.

But if Steele noticed, she said nothing. In fact, she just swallowed again. Closed her eyes. But not before Tom saw that determined thing flicker, a candle in the wind. It made his smile come back, made that boiling noxious rage inside him simmer low, the boiling over momentarily averted.

"You are. Aren't you?" he asked, nearly laughing, delighting in this. In the failing of her courage. The faltering of her oh so strong spirit. In the cracking of this girl that was delightful in its difficulty. Sweet in its slow pace that gave him time to languish in it. Time to breathe it in. Time to savor it.

And Merlin, was she giving him time.

Even now, even knowing he had won - for surely she couldn't have denied it - the only answer she had was, "No."

Tom raised a brow, smiled soft, smiled careful. "I thought you weren't a liar, Lucy darling," he chided. "Don't start now."

She swallowed again, shook her head, her face halfway to a statue, slipping only in the eyes, in the slight wobble of her jaw. "I'm not angry," she murmured.

Tom couldn't stop himself from rolling his eyes. There was enjoying the fall, there was the resistance to the last that he could appreciate. And then there was this. Which tasted more of stupidity than stubbornness.

"Oh please," he muttered. "You don't talk about him much, but I can put the pieces together. You say he hurt people. Say he burned." He shook his head, the gesture a mockery of the phrase she had used. "An extraordinary man," he pressed on, "but one you had to look for. One who left you behind. Don't tell me you're not angry, Lucy," added, mockery left behind, sweet tones abandoned, something like his own anger slipping in. Something like his own history threading the words. Something in his stomach not just boiling, but souring. Curdling.