72

" Someone tried to kill me..." I murmured, drying my tears in a precarious way.

"I know," he said. "It's my fault.

I shook my head, shaking to be placed on the floor. Zachary obviously didn't bother, and kept holding me against his chest, raised several centimeters from the ground.

"Don't give me this story," I retated, stubbornly.

A certain embarrassment prevented me from saying that I feared both for my safety and yours, and that I had really suspected your connection with what happened. I remembered with accuracy every word uttered by the unknown man before his body was devoured by the flames.

Zachary sighed and put me on the floor, looking so exhausted that I almost asked them to answer him in my place. He took my hand and took me to the first set of chairs, sat down and pulled me into his lap. The intimacy was again on the agenda, and I took advantage of it to drown any malaise with the flood of the senses that its mere physical contact had evoked in me, still in a slight stage o