"We need to talk," Phoenix says. "Privately."
Nicholas's gaze flicks to me, assessing. "Of course. Olive is in the sunroom. She can keep Jade company while we discuss the situation."
I stiffen at the dismissal, even though part of me is relieved. I don't want to sit in a room while Nicholas Crawford discusses whether or not to have someone killed. I don't want to see that side of this family, even though I know it exists.
Phoenix turns to me. "Will you be okay?"
"I'll be fine." The words come out steadier than I feel.
He leans down and presses a kiss to my forehead, lingering for just a moment. "I won't be long."
Then he follows his father down the hallway, and I'm alone in the massive foyer with nothing but the ticking of a grandfather clock for company.
"Ms. Catalano?"
I turn to find the woman in gray waiting patiently by a doorway on the opposite side of the room.
"Mrs. Crawford is expecting you. If you'll follow me?"
The sunroom is at the back of the house, a part of the estate I didn't see during the party. A beautiful glass-enclosed space that looks out over the gardens and, beyond them, the Pacific Ocean. Even through the fog, I can see the water stretching out to the horizon, gray and endless. The room itself is filled with plants, ferns and orchids and trailing vines that make it feel like a greenhouse, and the furniture is comfortable rather than formal. Overstuffed chairs in soft fabrics, a worn leather sofa, stacks of books on every available surface.
This doesn't match the rest of the house at all. This feels like a sanctuary.
Olive Crawford is curled up in one of the chairs with a tablet in her hands, reading glasses perched on her nose. She looks nothing like the elegant hostess who caught Phoenix and me in the library, the woman whose cool smile made me want to disappear. Today she's softer somehow, dressed in leggings and an oversized cashmere cardigan that's slipping off one shoulder. Her hair is loose around her face, and her feet are bare.
She looks almost human.
"Jade." She sets the tablet aside and removes her glasses, gesturing to the chair across from her. "Please, sit. Can I get you something? Tea? Coffee? Something stronger?”
"Tea would be lovely. Thank you." I stop before I follow her. "Mrs. Crawford, before anything else — I owe you an apology. For what happened at the library. I'm so sorry. I don't know what came over us. I've never done anything like that and that was so out of line.”
The words come out in a rush and then I have nowhere to put them. I press my lips together and look at a point somewhere past her shoulder and wait, my face burning.
She crosses to the sidebar without a word. A moment passes. Then another. She fills both cups without turning around.
She turns and crosses the room and holds out my cup, and when I take it her eyes meet mine for the first time since I walked in. Whatever she's looking for she seems to find.
"Call me Olive," she says. She settles back into her chair and picks up her own cup. "Mrs. Crawford is my mother-in-law, and I didn't much like her."
The laugh escapes me before I can stop it, startled and genuine.
The corner of Olive's mouth moves. Not quite a smile. But something.
The silence stretches for a beat longer than is comfortable.
"Phoenix tells me you're a writer," Olive says, changing the subject with grace. "What do you write?"
"Literary fiction, mostly. Or I used to." I set my cup down on the side table. "Short stories about people staring out windows and contemplating their feelings. Nothing anyone actually wants to read."
"And now?"
I hesitate. I haven't told anyone except Phoenix about the new project, and even with him I've been vague. But something about Olive's patient attention makes me want to share.
"I've been working on something different. A fantasy romance. Dark, atmospheric, about a woman who falls in love with a monster." I laugh self-consciously. "It's probably terrible."
"It sounds wonderful." Olive's eyes light up in a way I didn't expect. "I love a good dark romance. The tension, the moral ambiguity, the way love can transform even the most damaged characters."
"You read romance?"
