Picked it up again.
She bought it. And the pencils. At a steep discount. Because Trinity had wanted to just give them to her and Emily would not have that. She stuffed them in her tote bag and didn't mention them.
"Good haul?" Makenzie asked her.
"Sure," Emily said.
They drank their coffee at the high top bar and Emily let herself justbe there— swinging her legs in the warmth and the noise and the ordinary Thursday of it, and something in her unwound another inch.
She didn't think about Marcus Delling. She didn't think about the two missing women from Denver. She thought about the botanical coloring book in her bag and the coffee and Nicole telling a story about Clover that involved a stray cat, a garden hose, and what she described as Irish having "a significant overreaction."
She laughed until her eyes watered.
Savage, from his post by the window, appeared to fight a smile.
She set up at the kitchen table that afternoon.
Quietly. She'd waited until the common room emptied out, until Makenzie had gone upstairs to Irish’s apartment to take a nap and Nicole had gone home to her daughter and Savage and Savannah had disappeared. She spread out the coloring book and opened the tin of pencils and sat there for a moment looking at the blank botanical page.
She felt stupid. She felt twelve. She felt like she was doing something that needed to be done very privately. Women her age didn’t sit at a table and color when there was work to be done, right? She should go wash her clothes or clean the kitchen or take out her laptop and find another freelance job to do. She should pay her invoices for her shop and advertise for next week’s classes. Some of her regulars had been emailing asking when she’d be back. She could text The Naughty Girl’s Book Club or take out her kindle and read the next chapter… but she didn’t do any of it.
She picked up a pencil.
Twenty minutes in, she was completely somewhere else.
Not asleep, not checked out but somewherequiet.The particular quality of quiet that came when there was one task, one simple sensory thing, the scratch of pencil on paper and the decision about which shade of green for this leaf and whether the flower should be purple or blue, and nothing else, nothing pressing, nothing required.
She hadn't felt this relaxed in she didn't know. A long time.
She was so deep into her coloring she didn't hear him come in.
"That's a good picture," Rampage said.
She startled hard enough to smudge a line. Slapped the coloring book shut.
Then he was behind her, over her. His arms came around to her side and he opened it back to the page.
“Baby girl, slamming your book shut was the action of someone with something to hide,” he told her. “You have absolutely nothing to hide from me. Not now, not ever.”
She looked up at him.
He was looking at her with an expression that was, well nothing. Not amusement. Not judgment. Just neutral, the same way he looked at everything.
"Sorry," she said, even though she wasn't sure what she was apologizing for.
"Don't apologize." He backed up and stood beside her and bent down just close enough to see the page. "Botanical?"
"Yeah. I just—" She stopped. "I saw it in the bookstore. I find it calming."
"I’m glad you got it.”
She waited for more. For the knowing look or the leading question or the thing that would make her feel seen in the uncomfortable way. He pulled out the chair next to her and sat down with his coffee and his phone and started going through messages.
She stared at him.
"What?" he said, not looking up.
"You're not going to say anything?"
