Outside, it’s raining, just a soft morning shower sweeping in from the sea and misting the city.
The cool breeze and the earthy smell from below help clear my head.
If only they could keep Cleo Blackthorn the hell out permanently.
Keepingmy distance from Cleo is harder than I thought.
I think I’d have an easier time wearing a suit made of bees.
My first instinct is to make sure she’s all right, so when I see her stumbling around the apartment looking for aspirin, I have to force myself to stay where I am, planted outside with my laptop in the sunlight.
And later, again when she’s curled up with her sketch pad, her mouth pursed as she draws, her nimble fingers moving furiously over paper.
I have a blinding urge to find out what has her so inspired.
That’s what I tell myself anyway as I watch her stop to breathe and sip from a water bottle. Soft music plays from a Bluetooth speaker next to her, and she uses her bottle like a microphone, quietly singing along to some Lana Del Rey song.
Not quietly enough.
My lips turn up. She’s just as bad a singer as when she was a kid.
I hide my smile behind another cup of coffee.
At least it saves her from compulsively checking her phone, waiting for any word from Fairfax.
I know she’s waiting on tenterhooks. It kills me to be sitting out here, pretending to work just so I can avoid her, when I know she needs me.
But I wasn’t hired strictly for moral support.
I’m the muscle, the shield who makes sure innocent fuckups don’t turn into devastating losses. The shepherd assigned to ensure the jeweled egg and Cleo staysafe.
Everything else comes second to that.
It’s not like I’ve ever had a great bedside manner anyway, Kit aside. When Charli came home in rough shape, I put my bitterness aside.
I tried like hell to raise her spirits.
Flowers, her favorite movies, lavish meals she couldn’t tolerate anymore. Toward the end, she was grateful, I think, but none of it helped.
It didn’t lift morale enough to beat the inevitable. It couldn’t work miracles.
All the kindness in the world couldn’t bridge the gulf between us, let alone save her from an early grave.
I slurp my coffee angrily, banishing the memory.
Then I rivet my eyes to my screen for the rest of the morning, working at distractions. Anything besides dwelling on the past.
Kit’s school sent me an email about dress code changes. It’s already time to think about her summer activities, too, and there’s a long list for a girl as bright and curious as her.
I spend way too long reading every option.
By the time noon hits, I’m ready to jump off this balcony, but I settle for a stretch and a walk through the condo instead.
“Productive morning?” Cleo asks when I head back inside to find her perched on that uncomfortable sofa.
“Busy one,” I lie, wondering if she caught me looking her way a hundred times. “You?”
“Just killing time. Still waiting.” She stares at her phone bleakly, then tips her head back and sighs, pointed chin facing the ceiling. “I’m kinda disappointed. I just wish he’d let usknow,one way or the other. I thought he’d be more professional.”
