"Won't you please reconsider?"
Looking over Crystal again, I felt not only the intense attraction that had swept me as soon as our eyes locked together. I felt a sense of inferiority and even envy. The cream colored suit fit Crystal like how a cloth napkin draped elegantly over forks at the most expensive restaurants. I'd have to sell most of my shop to buy that three piece suit.
I chose not to respond. Instead, I sipped my coffee very slowly.
I recalled in a book I'd read as a teenager the main character being likened to Humphrey Bogart for choosing black coffee.
For me, it was a simple matter of expense.
And despite the enormous earnings my last job had given me, I still /felt/ poor. I'd stuffed away the cash among several banks (yes - a mage who chooses to trust non magical means of hiding money. Then I'd promptly forgotten about it.
I looked out the windows to an unforgettable view of Big Ben. Crystal had taken me to a famous building in London, where the dome sparkled with light and trellis climbed down from the uppermost point.
No, I hadn't forgotten about my new millions. I'd chosen to forget.
"Alex..." Crystal prompted.
For a single moment I considered throwing my coffee over Crystal's suit. The suit probably was thick, but not thick enough to prevent the burns.
Crystal must have been sufficiently distracted by trying to manipulate me, because no eyebrows lifted at that thought.
"I'll take your job," I said.
Because there was still something in the fine aristocratic world of the Council, where Light mages pirouetted in a dangerous dance under domed lights, that kept me coming back.
No, I would never fit in. Not even if I took all of Crystal's hereditary riches. But I could dance with the best of them and if only for a moment, let myself be entranced.
