“Stability,” he says. “Optics. The usual things men in old suits worry about when children put on masks and drink too much sugar.”
Nico laughs. It sounds like a hinge that needs oil.
My father ignores him. “I would like you to attend for the first course and then make your excuses. It is good for people to be reminded that you… exist.”
“Should I bring my halo and angel wings?” I ask without smiling.
“You bring your good sense,” he says. “And your jacket with sleeves. Roisin Shannon is said to be very competent. I would like you to meet her.”
Competent. Right hand. Sister.
I roll the words in my mouth and wonder what it costs her to be those things. I’d rather be necessary than decorative. To be the one with the numbers in her head, rather than the halo over it. I’d rather be called competent than holy. At least competence is something I own and not something I’m traded on.
“Of course,” I say.
My father nods like we’ve finished something important. “And Caterina,” he adds, voice casual, “you will tell me if anyone approaches you in a way that is… unseemly.”
He doesn’t say any of theIrish.He doesn’t say any of theShannons.
My heart thunders in my ribcage. He doesn’t sayin a church, behind a screen, with the door open and the rules written on your tongue.He can’t know. He can’t suspect…right?
He just looks at me with those eyes that see too much.
“If anyone approaches me in an unseemly way,” I say evenly, “you’ll hear my voice first.”
He takes that like a promise he has to pretend he trusts.
Nico sets his cup down too hard. The china clinks. “We could assign you a driver who stays closer,” he says, and bydriverhe meansshadowand bycloserhe meansinside your skin.
I turn my head just enough to meet his eyes. He likes being seen. He doesn’t like being understood. “I walk,” I say. “On a campus I’ve lived on for four years like a normal person.”
“There are no normal people,” he says, smiling in that too-white way that photographs well in terrible newspapers. “Only targets and the men who make sure they don’t look like easy ones.”
“I am not easy,” I say, and his smile falters for one blessed second.
“Basta,” my father murmurs, the sound half-exhale, half-command. Nico goes quiet in the way that means he’ll find another time to win.
My father pushes the folded paper aside. “I am proud of you,” he says, and I believe him even when I wish I didn’t need to. “Your projects—how are they?”
“Boring,” I say, because boring means safe. “Charity audits. Nonprofit accounting. The usual things we women in nice dresses worry about, I guess.”
He actually smiles at that. “Your mother would have liked that line.”
We don’t talk about my mother much. This is his way of saying he misses her and also he misses the person he thought I would be.
“I’ll text you about Friday,” I say, standing and lifting my chair carefully so its feet whisper against the rug. “I have class.”
He rises too. Kisses my temple, light as a stamp. “Be careful,” he says.
“I am always careful.”
Nico walks me to the foyer like a parole officer. He hands me my coat. Holds it hostage until I look at him.
“You’re playing with matches,” he says, all fake-cousin warmth stripped away. “Don’t light the house on fire because you like the color of the flame.”
I take the coat out of his hands without touching him. “Am I supposed to have any idea what you’re talking about, Nico?”
His eyes go flat. Then he remembers he is supposed to love me, and his mouth turns up into the shape of a cousin’s grin. “I’ll see you Friday.”
