The curtain slowly and quietly draws back, and I look up to give a tired smile to Adrian, who is coming in to sit with Maisie for the evening while I head back to Murphy’s bar and beg for my job back.
Because I still have no idea what we’re going to do about the eviction notice and the back rent that I’ll have to pay even if weareevicted, if I want a chance at renting anywhere else in this city.
“The doctors say she’s stable,” I whisper to him.
“That’s good news,” he whispers back, but his voice carries no real conviction. He’s trying to sound optimistic for my sake, but I can hear the exhaustion underneath. The fear. It’s the same tone that threads through my own voice, too.
Maisie’s condition isn’t getting worse, but it isn’t getting better, either. She’s trapped in some medical limbo while the bills pile up like storm clouds on our kitchen table back home.
I stroke my thumb across the back of her hand, careful not to disturb the IV taped to her wrist. She’s struggling to eat, and so the nurses recommended IV nutrition instead. Her skin is so pale I can see the blue veins underneath, delicate as watercolor. She looks impossibly young lying there in the hospital gown that swallows her small frame. Eleven years old and fighting a battle that would break most adults.
What kind of world makes a child suffer like this?
Earlier today I swallowed the remnants of my pride and called the number Leon gave me before I left Castle Blacklake, begging him to ask Eva to release the money.
She hasn’t, as of the last time I checked my account on my phone, which was about three minutes ago.
I hate that I even know how much money iswaitingout there in the ether. Hate that I can calculate down to the penny how long it will last, how many more weeks I can pay the rent and howmany more days for Maisie’s hospital stay that it might cover. Hate that I’ve become the kind of person who thinks in terms of dollars and cents when it comes to my siblings’ lives.
Most of all, I hate the treacherous little voice in the back of my mind that whispers:You sold yourself for nothing.
It wasn’t for nothing. I got enough money to keep us afloat for another few weeks. I just don’t know if it’s going to arrive in my bank account fast enough to save us.
But it has to. Ithasto.
One of these days, fate has to give us a break.
Right?
“Who’s that?” Adrian asks, and something in his tone makes me look up. His eyes are fixed on something beyond the curtain.
And then I see a silhouette approaching the curtain that cordons off Maisie’s space from the rest of the room, a shadow reaching up in preparation to pull the curtain aside.
My breath catches in my throat. I know that aura, would recognize it in a crowded room or a pitch-black alley. It’s like a shift in atmospheric pressure, the kind that warns of an approaching storm.
And when the curtain pulls aside, I can only stare with a sense of inevitability.
EvafuckingNovak.
She’s dressed in black from head to toe—a perfectly tailored jacket over a slim black dress that I know without a doubt is Chanel, and shoes with heels so high and sharp they could double as weapons. Her dark hair is pulled back in a chignonthat emphasizes the angles of her face, and her amber eyes are blank and empty as they meet mine.
She looks exactly the same. Untouchable. Dangerous. Beautiful in the way that a stiletto is beautiful—tapered, sharp lines and a deadly edge.
The nurses in the hallway beyond, usually chattering among themselves, have gone silent. It’s like the entire hospital is holding its breath, waiting to see what this elegant monster will do.
Heat rushes to my cheeks in a jumbled reaction of fury and disbelief and outrage. My body tenses instinctively, every muscle coiling like I’m preparing for a fight. My grip on Maisie’s hand tightens protectively.
“What the hell areyoudoing here?” I demand in a harsh whisper.
Eva steps into the room slowly. She doesn’t look at Maisie, doesn’t acknowledge the machines or the medical equipment or the fact that she’s intruding on the most private, vulnerable moment of my life. She only looks at me, and the weight of her attention pins me there.
“I came to make you an offer,” she says softly.
I almost laugh. “An offer I can’t refuse?”
“An offer you can’taffordto refuse,” she replies calmly, “if my sources are to be believed.”
Leon is skulking beyond her, and I send him a glare that he ignores.
