"It is not a negotiating point. It is not a line item in your arrangement, and it is not available for discussion." She took a breath. "Everything else, the work, the debt, the conditions, whatever you require from me, I will find a way. But not that." Her voice dropped half a degree. "Never that."
He studied her for a moment longer.
Then, with the slow deliberation of a man who had already made a decision he was perfectly satisfied with, he reached forward and lifted the small bowl beside her plate. She had barely noticed it. She had assumed it was soup. She had taken several spoonfuls with her sandwich without a second thought.
"Interesting position," he said calmly, "given that the soup you were quite happily consuming contains every ingredient traditionally used to....."
The bowl was in her hands.
And then it wasn't.
