Natalie trailed after Sofia. The locker rooms were a good distance away, so Sofia had plenty of time to notice. She was a petent delver, too, so was basically incapable of missing someone so pinly following her. Still, she ignored Natalie the whole way there. Natalie decided against jogging up and f the frontation before reag a somerivate building.

  When they arrived to the locker room, Natalie leased to find the space empty. It was one of many, with the locker rooms small and separated, so that wasn’t too odd—but it might not st long with matches starting to finish up. Sofa had pleted hers earlier than most; the event was schedule to go for another half hour.

  Sofia stalked to her locker, then agitatedly swung it open, the metal door g as it smacked into another.

  “Okay,” Natalie said. “The hell is this? What’s going on?”

  That was, admittedly, not the most ciliatory way to open the versation, but Sofia’s attitude had gotten on Natalie’s nerves. She hadn’t done anything. All of this had e out of nowhere.

  “Do you mind?” Sofia replied, not turning as she angrily rummaged around inside her locker. “I’m trying to get dressed.”

  “No. You’re being weird. I want to know what’s up.”

  “What do you mean? Nothing is ‘up’.” She almost growled the st word. Her rummaging-around became even mitated.

  “Uh-huh,” Natalie said, which turned out to be all the prompting Sofia needed.

  “I guess I just don’t get it,” Sofia said. “Not at all.”

  “Get what?”

  “You.”

  “Me?”

  “Or your hordes of lovers, I guess.”

  Which hadn’t remotely been the respoalie had been expeg. She paused, caught pletely off foot, before finally responding with an ineloquent, “What?”

  “Really. What’s the big deal?” Sofia asked. “Why is everyone always falling over you? It’s been like this forever.” She punctuated the statement with several aggressive bangs of metal inside her locker, violently moving items around.

  “What are you talking about?” Natalie asked. So this had been about Sammy, as had been her only remote guess. Natalie just didn’t uand why.

  “This is hardly new. But I holy figured Te would at least be more resistant to your ‘charms’.” She scoffed the st word. “But no. Not even a week in and you were getting into everyone’s pants. Just like always. So like I said, I just don’t get it.”

  “Get what?” Natalie asked. “And more than that, why would you care?” That was the even more fusing part, though Natalie was baffled from start to finish with this versation, not just there.

  “I don’t care,” Sofia growled, not doing a great job of selling the point. “I just said that I don’t get it. What, do you have magigers? How is it so easy for you?”

  Natalie ighe magigers ent, mostly because she didn’t know where to begin with it. “Easy?” she asked instead.

  “You just have to look at a girl for her to fall for you. Or at least get into her pants. Just know that I’m not sold. Besides,” Sofia scoffed, “I doubt you’re even that good.”

  “That … good?”

  “I mean, it ’t be that hard, anyway. They’re probably just easy to impress.”

  What was this woman going on about? Natalie knew what, since Sofia was all but spelling it out, but it was so baffling that Natalie sed guessed herself. Was Sofia talking about sex? Specifically, Natalie’s skill in it? Why? Natalie stared at her, at a loss for words.

  “I’m just saying,” Sofia said. “It wouldn’t matter how good you were. I certainly wouldn’t be tripping over my feet afterward, like these … these skanks.”

  Natalie bristled at that, sihe insult was clearly directed at Sammy, but she forcibly calmed herself. She could tell Sofia wasly speaking with a clear mind. That didn’t mean the words didn’t piss her off, but she moderated herself.

  “Uh-huh,” Natalie said. “And how, exactly, would you know? Aren’t you a virgin?”

  Which wasn’t a respohat took the high ground. She was no expert at trolling her emotioher—calming her annoya Sofia’s insult of Sammy had been the most she’d been capable of.

  And Natalie didn’t actually know Sofia’s level of experience, but by the way Sofia huffed, then tinued rummaging around angrily in her locker—and she was sure having a hard time finding whatever she was looking for—Natalie could tell she’d gotten it right.

  She wracked her brain for an expnation. Why would Sofia care about how easily Natalie hooked up with irls? And ent on her sex life in the first pce?

  “I get it,” Natalie said, the puzzle pieces finally clig. “You’re mad that I’m better than you at something. That’s what this is.”

  Sofia turned an incredulous look toward her.

  “That is the clusion you would e to, isn’t it?” Sofia said. “Don’t think too hard. You’ll hurt yourself. No, listen to what I’m saying. I’m telling you that I’m just fused. It doesn’t make sense how easy it is for you. And, again, I seriously doubt you’re that good.”

  Natalie knew from first hand experience Sofia could be annoying at the best of times, but this was a first. Insulting her ability in bed was, obviously, something Sofia had never done before. All of this in general had e out of nowhere.

  But it was still doing a great job of getting under Natalie’s skin. Sofia retty exceptional at that.

  “Three minutes,” Natalie said, crossing her arms. “If that.”

  “Excuse me?”

  “That’s how long it would take.”

  “Take?” Sofia asked ftly. “For what? What are you saying?”

  “Two, if I get to use my tongue.”

  Sofia paused.

  Natalie advanced on Sofia, and with wide eyes, Sofia stepped back, pinning herself against the metal lockers as Natalie closed the gap. Natalie loomed over her, then pced one hand to the right of Sofia’s head, palm ft against the metal. She leaned in close enough she could feel Sofia’s breath. It had happened instinctively; Natalie hadn’t eve to move.

  The way Sofia looked up at her, shocked, blue eyes wide, having goill as a rabbit, was uedly intoxig. Natalie wasly sure what had spurred her forward, but she liked Sofia’s respoo the invasion of space. She liked seeing her off-foot, vulnerable. Sofia had the upper hand way too often.

  “What?” Natalie teased, a hint of mog in her voice. “Isn’t that what this is? A challenge? I’m not gonna just stand there while you insult me. If you ‘don’t get it’, then maybe I should show you.” She leaned forward and whispered into Sofia’s ear. “And like I said. Three mi most. Maybe less. I get the feeling you’d be easy to take apart. I mean, look at you.”

  Sofia didn’t respond. She just gawked at Natalie, her chest rising and falling rapidly, face turning deeper shades of red by the moment. On her pale Theliosian skin, the effect was twice as noticeable.

  “What?” Natalie asked. “All that talk, and you ’t even find your voice when a girl invades your space? That’s kind of sad, princess.”

  Sofia swallowed. “Don’t be ridiculous. Is this a joke?”

  “Not at all.”

  “Don’t be ridiculous,” she repeated.

  “Scared of being proved wrong? What if I am that good? Maybe you’d be hanging all over me afterward, too.”

  “I r-really doubt that.”

  “Was that a stutter?” Natalie asked, delighted. It might have been the first time she’d ever heard it from the ever-posed, ever-elegant Sofia. She brushed Sofia’s cheek with a thumb, and Sofia closed her eyes and leaned into the touch. She froze, realizing what she’d done, and her eyes shot back open. Natalie also froze at the telling respohen ughed.

  “I haven’t even done anything, and you’re like this. You really would be easy to take apart.” Sofia didn’t even like Natalie, and she was responding in that way.

  “I— I—“

  “You rincess?”

  Sofia swallowed thickly, and the familiar defiant mask appeared—though its effect was rather diminished by her red face, and the way she was trembling under Natalie’s proximity. “You wouldn’t eve close. Three minutes? As if.”

  “Oh? So it’s a challehen?”

  “Yes. It is.”

  Natalie paused. She hadn’t expected Sofia to actually accept.

  She pced her palm on Sofia’s stomach, fingers pointed down. Sofia let out a shaky breath.

  “I take challenges seriously,” Natalie warned.

  “I’m well aware you have an ego.”

  “I have an ego?” Natalie asked incredulously. She slid her hand down an inch. “Sofia, I will take you up on this.”

  “And what do I get if I win?”

  “You won’t, so it doesn’t matter,” Natalie said ftly. “Are you kidding? I haven’t even started and you’re shaking.”

  “No, I’m not,” Sofia denied, her entire body trembling.

  Natalie slid her hand down another inch. Her fiucked into Sofia’s waistband, starting to slide under her pants. “What do I get if I win?”

  “You won’t, so it doesn’t matter,” Sofia replied, mogly parroting Natalie’s own response.

  Fine. A bet. Natalie sidered. “If I win,” she said, “you’re mine for the week.”

  “And what does that mean?”

  “Whatever I want it to. And the same goes for you.”

  Sofia hesitated.

  “But you won’t lose,” Natalie said, “so who cares, right?”

  Unsurprisingly, the hesitation wiped away. The gre came back. “You’re right. I won’t, so it doesn’t.”

  “It’s a bet?”

  “Yes.”

  Natalie’s blood surged.

  Given permission, she didn’t waste time. She started fumbling open Sofia’s pants button.