We’re back in that charged, too-close space.
Her eyes flick to my mouth.
Something in my chest claws at my ribs.
“Careful,” I say, voice low. It comes out sounding like a warning about more than footing.
“You’re the one who keeps throwing me at the ground,” she says. “I’m just…obeying physics.”
“You keep coming back,” I say.
Her breath stutters.
“Maybe I’m bad at math,” she murmurs.
“Maybe,” I say.
We stand there a heartbeat too long.
Brodie clears his throat, deliberately loud. “Any day now. Bureaucrats get twitchy if you make them wait. Then they start writing memos.”
Twig steps out of my hands like she’s been burned.
“Coming,” she says, too bright.
As we walk back toward the house, her sleeve brushes mine.
I don’t move away.
But I keep my hands very carefully to myself.
Kael’s threat isn’t the only thing holding them there, but it’s the loudest.
Later,afterBradyandState try to cram Henry into neat little boxes over video call, after Cotton falls asleep on the couch with her feet in Brodie’s lap and Savvi scolds us all into eating dinner, Tallulah ends up in Cotton’s office again, laptop open.
At some point she mutters a curse and flexes her fingers.
“You okay?” I ask from the doorway.
“Fine,” she says.
She’s not. One of her knuckles is pink and swelling.
“Let me see,” I say.
“I’m fine,” she repeats.
“Twiggy,” I say.
She huffs but holds out her hand.
I take it carefully and turn it palm-up, brushing my thumb over the angry joint. Her breath catches.
“Does that hurt?” I ask.
“Define ‘hurt,’” she says. “On a scale of one to ‘Henry exists.’”
“On a scale of one to ten,” I say.
