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Then, she breaks the connection. “You want to have breakfast?”
I slide inside. “Yes, please.”
I want to touch her, but I refrain from doing so. I am just sitting next to Mila giving her a kiss on the forehead as she is offering me a bite of her soggy cereal.
I make sure that she sees the regret on my face as I turn it down.
“Thank you.” Eve’s voice is clear, normal.
I look up to see her watching me from the stove. “What for?”
She gives a wry smile. “You know. I’m not going to spell it out for you.”
The fragile woman is gone, replaced by this steely-eyed woman who is ready to take on the world again.
As she puts a plate heaped with eggs, bacon, and stir-fried vegetables in front of me, I shake my head. “No. You don’t get to say thank you.”
She blinks.
“You gave me a gift, last night. You offered me your trust, and I took it.”
Her eyes grow dark, an inscrutable look in them. Their gaze holds for a few moments, a clarity in it that wasn’t there before, a calm acceptance.
Then Eve smiles, a small curving of her lips. “You’re right.”
As she moves to the table, she says, “I called Dina. Lorraine’s in a coma, but they’ve moved her out of the ICU. They’ll bring her out of the coma in the afternoon. The police—”
The look on my face makes her pause. “What?”
I put down my fork, my heart feeling heavy. “There’s something you need to know.”
She trusts me so I can’t lie.
Eve stares at the articles, reading through them, one after the other, her gaze not flinching.
Despite the churning fury in my gut, I couldn’t help the feeling of pride.
My steely-eyed warrior is back.
She picks up the photographs that Agatha printed out and brought along with her. The one she is holding is with her face buried in my chest, her back to the camera, while the cold look in my face was aimed directly at the lens.
She looks at Agatha and then back at the numerous articles scattered across the coffee table.
We are sitting in the living area, and Agatha occupies the armchair while Eve sits adjacent to her on the long couch, me sitting on the arm of the couch, my leg touching her thigh.
“This is going to ruin me,” Eve says softly, as if digesting the news. “People won’t want to attend a dance school where they won’t be safe.”
“It could also have the opposite effect,” Agatha interjects. “People are fascinated by these sort of things. You might end up getting more business.”
Eve doesn’t look convinced.
She picks up a discarded article, and a dry chuckle escapes her lips; this time she glances up at me. “Apparently, I’m your ‘whore.’ That’s new.”
She doesn’t look insulted, managing to find some measure of humor in this whole thing.
Then she tosses down the paper and rubs her hands over her face, sighing heavily. “Mila will have to change schools.”
“What?”
