Page 4 of Infernal Affairs

I hand her a cookie, and she bites into it with obvious delight.

For a moment, the only sounds are the soft click of rain and the gentle crumble of baked goods.

Daisy hums contentedly through her mouthful.

“You know, people say you’re intimidating, but I don’t see it,” she says finally.

“I could summon a pillar of fire,” I offer. “Or quote Dante in the original Italian.”

She laughs.

Not a polite, manufactured sound, either—a real, crinkly-nosed laugh.

It’s so infectious I feel my own face heat, which is a feat considering my natural temperature runs volcanic.

“Wouldn’t work,” she says. “I’m immune to pretentiousness. Grew up with six brothers.”

She wipes a crumb from her collarbone, then looks at me with sudden, earnest curiosity.

“Why did you become a therapist? Most... supernatural types seem to enjoy causing problems, not solving them.”

Fair question.

And not the first time I’ve heard it.

Still, it’s the first time I feel any urge to answer honestly.

“Some of us want to break the cycle,” I say after a moment. “Help others avoid the traps we fell into.”

She seems to digest this.

“That’s... really lovely,” she says, and from anyone else I might suspect sarcasm, but from Daisy, it lands like a blessing.

Then something in her expression shifts—an old, familiar uncertainty.

“Hey, Dr. Infernalis⁠—”

“Enoch,” I correct, hoping I don’t come off as stuffy. “Please. I get enough ‘Doctor’ from insurance spam.”

“Enoch,” she repeats, testing the shape of the name. “Do you only take supernatural clients? Or would you see someone normal? Hypothetically?”

I study her for a second.

“That’s a trick question,” I say at last. “There is no such thing as normal. And I like hypotheticals. They tend to be more honest than the real thing.”

Something in her posture loosens.

She smiles, and I am hit again by the softness of her presence—like a thick quilt drawn up to my chin on a night when the wind cuts through the lighthouse searching for cracks.

I’d forgotten how it felt to be spoken to as a man rather than a monster.

“Well,” Daisy says, rising, “if you ever need a taste tester for those cookies—or, you know, company when your three o’clock cancels—I’m across the street most days. And I don’t mind being your hypothetical for a little while, if you’d like.”

She leaves behind a box of cookies and a lingering warmth that seems to follow her out the door.

I sit for a long time after she goes, the rain drumming harder against the windows, the taste of lavender lingering on my tongue, considering the possibility that I might allow myself something soft for once.

CHAPTER 2