Rory waits until the silence proves I won’t fill it for him. Then he crosses the room in three strides and pulls me into his arms.
I let him. For one breath, I’m held by someone who knew me before my father became a body under a sheet. Someone who smelled like rain, wool, tobacco, and home before home became a place I couldn’t return to without losing the only thread I have.
My throat tightens. I hate that. I step back before it can become anything visible.
His hands remain on my shoulders. “You’re thinner.”
“That’s a rude opening,” I shoot back.
“You look tired.”
“Also rude.”
“You look?—”
“Careful,” I warn.
He stops. There are words men shouldn’t say when women are holding themselves together with habit and spite. “Broken” is one. “Fragile” is another. Anything said softly is always suspect.
His hands fall. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“No,” I say. “Most of my recent decisions have had that quality.”
“I’m taking you home.”
I study him. He doesn’t look like a man making a dramatic rescue attempt. No visible weapon. No flushed temper. No men kicking in doors behind him. His coat is dry, which means he has been brought through properly. His shoes are clean, which means he didn’t come through the garden.
He isn’t here to improvise. He has an arrangement.
“Are you?” I ask.
“Yes.”
He moves to the small table and picks up a folded document I hadn’t noticed.
That annoys me.
“What’s that?” I ask.
“Your exit.”
That word should do something to me. It doesn’t.
“The terms are settled,” he says.
“With whom?”
“With the parties that matter.”
“That’s a very male sentence.”
His mouth tightens. “Evie.”
“Which parties, Rory?”
“The Vitales.”
“Alessandro?”
