Robin’s eyes widen further. “What if it’s someone dangerous? What if?—”
I reach out my hand and she takes it. “I gave my word that your family would be protected in your absence,” I remind her, my tone soft but firm. “I won’t break my word, Robin. Trust me.”
She stares at me for a long moment, searching my face for something. Whatever she finds there seems to reassure her, because her voice is steadier when she speaks into her phone once more. “Adrian? Eva wants you to go down and talk to the man in the car. Just…be careful, okay?”
We wait in tense silence. Robin paces in front of my desk while I remain still, projecting a calm I don’t entirely feel. If something has happened to her family, if my protection has failed…
“Oh, thank God,” Robin breathes, and her shoulders sag with relief. “He says the man told him he’s there on Eva Novak’s orders. And that I say hello.”
The tension leaves the room like air from a punctured balloon. Leon nods and disappears as silently as he came, leaving Robin and me alone. She finishes her call with her brother and then gives a long, hard sigh of relief.
“I’m sorry,” she says. “I just got so worried?—”
“Come here,” I say, gesturing to her now-usual place on the floor beside me.
Robin sinks down next to me almost gratefully, her face still pale but the panic fading from her eyes. I study her for a moment, taking in the worry lines around her eyes, the way she unconsciously twists her hands hard around the arm of my chair.
I card my fingers through her hair. “I’m sorry I worried you by talking about the Gattos the other night,” I say. “I should have realized it would bother you.”
She shakes her head. “It’s…not really that. I…” She looks away.
“You demanded emotional openness from me. And yet you’ve been distant yourself the last few days. What’s wrong?”
For a moment, I think she won’t answer. Then she looks down at her hands and whispers, “I just miss them. My family. That’s all.”
Of course she misses them. She’s spent her entire adult life caring for them, sacrificing for them, building her identity around being their protector and provider.
And I’ve taken her away from that, isolated her in my gothic fortress where she has no purpose beyond entertaining me.
“I know you’ll protect them,” she continues, her voice barely audible. “And I’m grateful, more than you know. But it’s not really about that. It’s just about notbeingthere. Not tucking Maisie in when she has nightmares, or helping Alicia with her homework, or making sure Dane doesn’t skip school. They need me, and I need them. And—” She hesitates again, but I nod for her to go on. “Sometimes I feel like I’m disappearing here. Like I’m losing pieces of myself.”
Her words sting. I want to tell her that she’s wrong, that she’s not disappearing, that she’s becoming more herself than ever. But the truth is more complicated than that. In bringing her here, in keeping her for myself, I’ve severed her from the things that give her life meaning.
I have no family to miss the way she misses hers. But I alsowantedthis life, I remind myself. I chose power over everything else. So it’s not fair to envy what I cut out of my life on purpose.
But watching Robin’s face, seeing the love and longing there, I wonder what it would feel like to be needed the way she’s needed. Not for what I can provide or the protection I can offer, but simply for who I am.
“You’re a good sister,” I say finally, the words inadequate but true.
Robin looks up at me with surprise. “I try to be. They’re all I have.”
The irony isn’t lost on me. She says they’re all she has after coming here with the promise of ten million at the end of it. But I understand what she means. I’m beginning to see that money and power are cold comforts compared to the warmth of genuine love.
“I’m sorry I bothered you,” she says with a self-deprecating smile.
“You didn’t. Not at all.”
“I’ll let you get on with your work.” She rises to leave, then pauses at the door. “Eva?”
“Yes?”
“Thank you. For protecting them. For keeping your word. It means…everything.”
It means everything to her, but she’s still homesick. Still longing for her family. Still sees me—fairly—as the woman who took her away from them.
I need to make her happy. Make herenjoyher time with me, so that she’s not so homesick.
After a few phone calls, I have the perfect distraction set up.
