“Ouch,” Crow said with dry sarcasm when Penelope jokingly called him an ass. His smirk turned from smug to teasing. “You’re right though. I should have upped the bet from ‘one favor’ to ‘servant for a day’ when I had the chance. Next time I’ll think it through a little more.” Crouching down, he rocked back on his heels until he was sitting on the edge of the roof with his legs dangling freely over the side. Even though he’d already won, he couldn’t keep himself from milking his victory just a bit longer.

When Penelope said he had gotten lucky that she hadn’t looked up, he rolled his eyes. Despite what she said, he knew quite well that she was unlikely to have thought of checking the rooftops. It was a trick he’d pulled on knights for years. People in general didn’t seem to think about what was above their heads unless they had a reason to look there. A few knights had figured him out when he’d used the tactic in the past, but they were in the vast minority compared with the ones who had run right under his nose.

At her following words, he grinned. “Yeah, right,” he laughed. “You like me too much to leave me behind. I’m not risking anything.” Still, he shifted further over the edge of the roof, supporting most of his weight on his hands before he dropped down to the stack of crates below. As fun as it was to toy with Penelope, he didn’t want to waste too much time in Bellmare and miss out on supper later.

Climbing down from the boxes, he strode back over to her side and pressed a kiss to her cheek as he handed the coin purse back. “But, I do want you to [i]keep[/i] liking me, so I’ll listen just this once,” he quipped, casting her a playful wink. “Come on, love. You’ve distracted us for long enough. We need to get back to the castle sometime today.”