“Do not touch my bag,” I said.
He looked at me.
“That was one of your terms.”
“Yes.”
“And you broke mine first.”
“I didn’t agreenotto cook dinner.”
“No,” he said with gritted teeth. “You agreed, implicitly, not todrug meat my own table.”
“You don’t know that.”
His expression softened with amusement.
“Céline…Selena.Be real with me.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
He entered my room and opened my bag. My bag sat on the chair beside the bed, exactly where I had left it. He unzipped the inner pocket without hesitation, as if he had always known where to look.
He removed the bottle.Empty.
The small plastic thing looked obscene in his hand.
He turned it once, reading the label. Then he laughed.
“Benzodiazepines, my love?”
Heat rushed to my face so fast I felt dizzy.
“Don’t call me that.”
“You emptied the bottle.”
“You went through my bag. You had no right!”
“Yes.” His eyes lifted. “And you tried topoisonme.”
“I tried to protect myself.”
“That is what you call it?”
“What would you call it then?”
“Murder, if you had been competent enough to finish the thought.”
My breath caught.
He smiled faintly, but there was no warmth in it now.
“Tell me, Céline. How exactly were you planning to get away with another murder when you were already so careless with the first one?”
There was no pretending after that.
No performance available. No clever answer. No lie beautiful enough to dress the truth.
