The kitchen has gone quiet. Even Christopher has stopped eating.
“I need to be the one to end this,” I say. “Properly. So we know it's over.”
CHAPTER 14
Divide & Conquer
IVY
I quickly change into my clothes fit for a meeting at the Foundation, and Alistair finds me in the hallway before he leaves.
He puts both hands on my face and looks at me for a moment in that way he has—the inventory, the reassurance, the thing he does when he wants to remember exactly where I am before he goes somewhere I can't follow—and then he kisses me. Properly. Unhurried. As if we have all the time in the world.
He picks up his jacket. “Check your yoga studio before you leave for your meeting.”
“What?” I say.
But he is already gone, Henderson behind him, the front door closing with a soft decisive click.
I stand in the hallway and listen to the car pull away through the gates and then I stand there a little longer because I don't knowwhat else to do with the feeling in my chest. I don't like this. I don't like any of this.
Becks appears from the kitchen with her coat already on and her bag over her shoulder, ready to leave. While I’m winding a scarf around my neck and hunting for my coat, Brumilde appears with Alex on her hip. He sees me and his face does that thing—that immediate and total brightening that melts my heart—and he reaches out both arms toward me. I need to go, but he keeps reaching.
I know I need to leave now to be on time for the briefing at the Foundation, but I take him. He comes into my arms and immediately and goes completely still against my shoulder. His little hand finds my collar and holds tight. When I try to give him back to Brumilde, he whimpers, and I feel my lips curve down. Poor baby.
Becks, beside me, is quiet for a moment. Then: “Work from home this morning,” she says. “We’ll divide and conquer. Come in this afternoon, if you like. The briefing will be easy. I’ll hold the fort.”
“But—” There was so much work to do, and it was unfair to place so much of it on Becks’ shoulders.
“Saint Ives.” She pats her bag. “I've got it.” She kisses my cheek, waves at Brumilde, and goes. The front door closes behind her.
I help myself to more coffee and sit in the rocking chair—me and Alex and the morning light coming through the nursery window onto the garden. Reacher settles at my feet with a long contented sigh. Bijou turns three circles on the rug and collapses against him.
Alex is warm and solid against my chest. I rest my lips on the top of his head.
This precious child.
His breathing slows almost immediately. His hand, still clutching my collar, gradually loosens its grip.
I rock slowly and look out at the garden and think about Alistair.
The luxury London apartment. Elena Kuznetsova in whatever room she has chosen for this, composed and waiting.She let herself be found.
Alex makes a small sound against my shoulder. Not distress. Just a comment.
“Yes,” I say quietly. “I know.”
This,I think, looking out at the garden—the security team moving at the perimeter, the pale English sky, the dogs asleep at my feet, this warm heavy child on my chest. It’s the strangest thing, how the world can be so imperfect and so completely, impossibly perfect at exactly the same time.
By the time I look down at Elena Kuznetsova’s grandson again he is deeply asleep.
I take him upstairs, put him in his crib, and stand there for a moment looking at him.
The yoga studio—or what I have been calling the yoga studio for months without ever actually turning it into one—is at the end of the upstairs corridor. I have been meaning to set it up sincewe moved in. There is, currently, a rolled-up yoga mat leaning against the wall and three cardboard boxes of things that have not yet found a home elsewhere, and I have been walking past it every day with the vague intention of dealing with it at some point.
I push open the door and then stand in the doorway for a long moment.
It is also, somehow, still a yoga studio—the mat is there, unrolled now and laid out properly along the far wall, a clean bright rectangle of space that is still available for sun salutations, but the rest of the room is something else. Bookshelves, fitted and full. A proper desk—solid, beautiful, facing the window that looks out over the garden. A small sofa against the wall in a fabric the color of sage. A painting of Jamie’s hanging on the wall that makes my sinuses sting with emotion. Morning light falling across the vase of fresh flowers on the desk—white and green, simple—and beside them, a note.
