Her mouth pursed, but she quickly schooled her expression. “Well. It must be then. Best wishes to you both.” She gave me a tight smile. “Tell Greid I said hello.”

Unable to stop myself, I gave her a saccharine smile back. “I don’t know who you are.”

That made her nostrils flare, and I allowed myself a mental victory punch into the air.

“Agma.” She chuckled. “I’ve probably come up. I’m sure he has some of my silly little sculptures still in his house.”

He did, but he’d told me it was only because he liked them, not because she’d made them. I wasn’t going to let her know that.

“I haven’t noticed any sculptures, but yeah. He’s mentioned you.”

A hint of smugness shone in her sultry yellow eyes before she smoothed her face out again. “Well anyway, sorry again for intruding. I just thought, what a small world, huh?”

“Yeah,” I managed. “Small world.”

Which she’d already known when she told all her friends private things about Greid. Knowing how shy he was. Knowing about his social anxiety. Knowing how she’d made him feel when he’d told her things he wanted and she’d made him feel like crap for them.

My anger was boiling over. I glanced back to see that Mani had disappeared down to the other end of the bar and was chatting to Gavin. Kayr was restocking one of the fridges down that end too. There were no other customers waiting near us.

“Can I say something?” I put the card machine down on the bar and stepped closer. “Agma?”

She blinked, taking another sip of wine before setting her glass neatly on the coaster. “Sure.”

I gripped the edge of the bar and leaned in. “What you did was really fucking terrible.”

Her head reared back, offence colouring her elegant features. “Excuse me?”

“Telling personal information about Greid to your friends was a really shitty thing to do.”

I was shocked to see her ears twitch, guilt filling her eyes as they darted around. “Look—”

“I don’t know if you thought he’d never find out, or if you were hoping he would. Either way, it doesn’t matter.” I glanced back to make sure Mani still wasn’t anywhere near us. “It was cruel. And nasty. You had no right.”

Trying to regain my composure, I straightened and smoothed down the front of my apron. “So yeah, that was what Greid told me about you. You haven’t come up otherwise. Thankfully.”

I turned to leave, knowing I needed to go calm down, but Agma’s throaty voice stopped me.

“Wait.”

Against my better judgement, I turned to face her again, making sure my expression was a blank mask.

She looked like she couldn’t decide whether to be angry or ashamed, her mouth pinched and eyes tight. “Look, I made a mistake. I got drunk with my friends after Greid and I split up, and… I told them some things I shouldn’t have. Okay? We’ve all done it. We’ve all bitched about our exes.”

“Getting drunk isn’t an excuse.”

Her ears fluttered, nostrils flaring again. “Well sorry I’m not little-miss-perfect human.”

“What?” I stared at her incredulously. “I don’t—”

“Clearly you can accept Greid and his… kinks. It doesn’t make me a bad person because I couldn’t.”

I took a breath. “I never said you were a bad person for not—”

“He told me things he wanted that I didn’t understand and wasn’t into. Okay?” Her tone was getting increasingly defensive, and her long fingers were gripping the stem of her wine glass tightly.

“Didn’t anyone ever teach you manners?” I snapped. “Stop interrupting me. It’s rude.”

She reared back in outrage, mouth opening and closing wordlessly a few times, before she narrowed her eyes at me. “Must I remind you that I am in fact a customer here?”

I was well aware that this was an extremely bad idea, one that could technically result in me losing my job for arguing with a customer who hadn’t actually done anything to me, but my temper had flared and was burning too hot for me to take a second and calm down.

I could hear the threat in her words. I saw the way her yellow eyes looked over my shoulder in the direction of Mani at the other end of the bar. She was definitely going to complain about me to the manager.

But then I pictured Greid’s shy, uncertain expression the first few times we’d slept together. I pictured him standing in the cult’s compound all that time ago, looking flustered and wildly out of his element. At the time, I’d been furious at the thought of a demiurgus going there to take advantage of all those adoring humans, but now I knew the truth. He’d been lonely because of what the snooty woman in front of me had done. She’d made him feel like crap, then ostracised him from their mutual acquaintances and ensured that her shy, socially anxious ex would be too embarrassed to show his face in those circles again.

My face grew hot with anger, some fiercely protective instinct flaring in my chest, making it squeeze tighter and tighter until it felt like I’d have to shout to let it out.

“I’m just going to assume that you didn’t receive enough attention as a child, so now you feel the need to tell people personal information about others just so they’re paying attention to you.” My voice was a low, ugly hiss. “I’m also going to assume that nothing interesting whatsoever happens in your own life, so you have to resort to sharing other people’s secrets just to get that attention.”

Agma’s ears were shivering rapidly, her face spikes flaring forward like she was facing down a predator and instinctively going into defensive mode. “You don’t get to fucking talk to me like that. I’m a customer.”

“I can talk to you however the hell I want to.” I jabbed a finger on the bar and glared at her. “You don’t like getting a taste of your own medicine? You were happy to make Greid feel like shit for telling you things that were difficult for him to admit to. Sure, you’re right, of course you don’t have to do anything you don’t want to. But you’re a fucking adult, Agma. You could have told him that like an adult without making him feel strange or ashamed.”

“Mine and Greid’s relationship is none of your fucking business,” she hissed.

“No, it’s not, but how it affected him is.” I leaned in, aware that I was pushing my luck. I had no idea where Mani was, or if she’d noticed us. “You did a shitty thing, Agma. You had no business telling anyone, and you had no right to shame Greid just because you’re closed-minded. You should be ashamed of yourself.”

She looked down quickly, her throat working as she swallowed repeatedly, her claws tinkling against the stem of her wine glass as she fidgeted in her seat. She actually did look ashamed, but before either of us could say anything more, I heard Mani’s voice come from behind me.

“Everything okay here, Beryl?”

Fear tightened my stomach. Fuck.

“Everything’s fine.” My voice shook with suppressed anger. Even with my boss’s presence, I couldn’t bring myself to give Agma a polite smile. “Let me know if you need a top-up.”

Snatching up the card machine, I turned and walked quickly to the register to put it back. I tried counting backward from five in my head to calm down, but it didn’t work. Especially when I realised Mani had followed me.

“Hey.” She squeezed my shoulder, but it just made me even tenser. “Come with me.”

Fuck. I didn’t know what she’d heard, but it must have been clear that I was arguing with Agma. With a customer. God, I’d been so unprofessional. I should have just walked away when she’d made an attempt to end the conversation. What had I even gained from calling her out on what she’d done? I didn’t feel any better, and it wasn’t like it made a difference to Greid. She’d already made him feel self-conscious over what he liked. She’d already told people.

I didn’t say anything as I stiffly followed Mani toward the back office. But then she turned, heading down the corridor to the restrooms, and kept going to the door marked PRIVATE ENTRY at the end.