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Miss Reach’s brow lowered. “I’m asking if you two are lovers.”

Gina had to stop and blink at her sudden bluntness.

Madison waited.

“I...” Gina reconsidered what she was about to say. Something on Madison’s face was telling her that there was little point in dancing around it. “No, we’re not lovers, but...”

“Good. That’s a relief. Because I’m sure you’ve noticed by now that I like him. And I wouldn’t want to interfere with anything the two of you have.”

“Well, I don’t know if... agh...”

Madison tilted her head. “You don’t know if, what? You wouldn’t mind if I started dating him, would you?”

Gina’s expression tightened. “Yes! I’d mind!” She might’ve said that louder than she’d meant to, because Madison flinched in apparent surprise. Gina took a second to settle herself. “To be perfectly honest, yes, I would mind. It would bother the crap out of me.”

“...Oh.”

A part of Gina wanted to just leave it at that, but it wouldn’t have felt right. “But, look, it’s not that simple with Master Roman. He’s not... agh... how do I put this...?”

“Oh, you mean he’s gay?”

“No...” A beat passed. “At least, I’m pretty sure he’s not.”

“You aren’t certain?”

“Well, I’ve never seen him with a guy. Intimately, I mean. But the thing is... I’ve never seen him with a woman, either.”

“Ah, so he keeps his private life private, huh?”

That was one way of putting it, Gina supposed--an inaccurate way, but a way, nonetheless. She could’ve elaborated. She could’ve told Madison about her own past obsession with Master Roman, about how she used to watch his every move on the mansion’s security footage, how she tracked his phone and kept logs of all his conversations.

She could’ve brought all that up. But she decided against it.