They watch her walk towards me with those eyes, dead-set and unblinking, drilling into me like I’m the only point on the map. Last time I saw that face, I was three months pregnant, and every breath was another invitation for her ridicule.
“Fawn?”
I don’t move.
“Is that you?”
My body runs cold.
I want Clay.
Imagining Clay’s finger at my chin, I straighten. I give my henchmen the smallest nod—the Clay Butcher nod that speaks volumes. I have been practising it, feeling a tingle of pride when they catch it. They exchange a loaded glance, then hang back, shoulders squared, not blinking, not breathing, nothing but watchfulness holding them steady as my foster mother closes the distance between us.
"Eleanor," I breathe, the name clawing out of my throat, brittle and thin. The flower attendant backs away a few steps, a perceived distance for privacy.
"Fawn, dear," Eleanor croons, syrupy, that practised sweetness curling around each syllable. "I thought that was you. My gosh.”
My mouth goes dry. "What are you..." It hurts to force the word out. "What do you want?"
A flicker of insult crosses her face, the surprise and annoyance quickly wiped away by that polite but curious mask of hers. The same one she used with the social workers and the police when I misbehaved.
"I heard you were doing well," she says, looking me up and down. "I saw a girl on the news. Mr Clay Butcher's new fiancé. Looked just like you. Was that you?" Her gaze stalls on the henchman to my right, then Bronson. "Obviously, it’s true," she finishes, surrendering the pretence. Her eyes drag down my body again, landing on my flat belly. "Where is the baby?"
"Dead,” I say quickly. “I miscarried."
She. Does. Not. Deserve. An explanation!
Her lips barely move. "And you expect me to believe that? On the news, I saw twins. Twins, Fawn."
I scoff. "I thought you weren't sure it was me? Another lie. What do you want?”
She sighs, the gears of her annoyance grinding through that sound. "You always jump to conclusions," she murmurs, and for a moment it's like we're in some version of the past, but I don't let it confuse me. "But a mother worries, you know."
"You're not my mother."
You could have been.
You didn’t want to be.
"I know we've had our differences,” she offers. “But the twin boys, couldn’t they be?—"
"They are not Benji's!" I snap. She loved Benji—the golden child. The boy who raped me, who is now dead. "My twin sons. They are Clay Butcher's.”
She gapes. "You moved so fast. How did you manage that? One minute you’re pregnant with one of my boys’ babies, thenext you disappear and now you have twins. It hasn’t even been two years.”
I hear a word in her tone.Slut.She called me one so often, even while I was still a virgin, she must feel such satisfaction right now.
A song abruptly breaks the air like a plate shattering on a brick wall. "Match in the gas tank,” Bronson sings, “boom, boom.”
I turn to look at him, the outburst almost haunting. He's behind me, hands busy with stems, his tattooed fingers clashing against soft white petals.
I want her gone.
Does he sense that?
I want her gone, like a fucking nightmare. Where is my dreamcatcher—I’ll use it to choke her. "It was nice to see you. Please leave me alone now.”
The henchmen move in, a wall of muscle, silence, and unforgiving authority determined to separate her from me in a wave of smooth action.
