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Dr. Marquez met with Siena, too, and talked about this kind of stuff, but Siena wanted to know whatGenevathought she needed. Between Geneva’s lingering anger over the stuff with the counselor, and Siena needing to take more shifts to pay for the therapy—even with a sliding scale, the rates for these therapists were painfully high—their little house had turned into an emotional refrigerator. Siena knew the only way they’d become a team again is if Geneva reclaimed the trust that Siena was on her side.
Geneva pushed a meatball through a spaghetti trench. She didn’t look up when she answered, “I don’t want you to do anything. I want you to do nothing.”
“Gennie ...”
Her head shot up and she glared straight into Siena’s eyes. “Don’t call me that! I tell you and I tell you and you don’t listen. You always think your way is the right way.”
“It was amistake, Geneva. I called you that since you were a baby. It’s hard to change a habit like that, but I do respect your choice about your own name. I’m ... I’m just not perfect. I make mistakes.”
“Like butting in where you don’t belong.”
“I’m not sorry I told Dr. Granger. I amverysorry for the way it turned out for you, but I was trying to protect you.”
“You didn’t.”
“I know.”
A small burst of defensiveness entered Siena’s emotional swirl, and she considered making the point that it was the counselor who’d fucked it all up so badly, not Siena. But before she could decide whether it was something worth saying aloud, the doorbell rang.
Siena looked over her shoulder as if she could see through the door. They didn’t get visitors these days. Siena had no real friends, and now neither did Geneva. They didn’t have the money to do a lot of online shopping, so they didn’t get many packages, either.
They were a sad little pair, weren’t they? Born to live poor and hard and to die young and alone.
“Are you expecting somebody?” she asked, though she knew the answer.
Geneva shook her head and returned her attention to her plate.
Luis’s father was last person who’d knocked on their door. That had been a while ago, but Siena’s tension felt fresh and new.
The bell rang again, and this time it was followed by a short series of impatient knocks. The kind of knock that saidI know you’re in there.
Unable to name any potential friendly visitor, Siena could imagine only threat.
“Go to your room, Geneva.”
“I’m still eating.”
“You can come back out when whoever’s out there is gone. Now, go to your room.”
“But—"
“Now.”
Siena almost never acted like a ‘parent’ in the sense of laying down the law, thus Geneva took it seriously on the rare occasion it happened—but taking it seriously was not the same thing as taking it with good grace. She dropped her fork to her plate, jumped up from her chair, and stomped off.
When Siena heard the bedroom door slam, she went to the cabinet in their old entertainment center and pulled out another small gun safe, in which she kept her tiny purse pistol when she was home. This was only a .22. The .38 in her nightstand was more impressive, but it was farther away.
Thumbing the lock, she opened it and removed the Beretta from it. She checked the mag. Then she went to the door and checked the peephole.
Cooper stood on her front porch.
Not a word had passed between them since the night he’d saved her from Jorge and then she’dstupidly, stupidlygone to his house with the idea of thanking him and maybe smoothing things over and seeding a neighborly friendship.
But he’d been a total asshole, so instead of smoothing things over, she now did everything she could do avoid all contact with him, even eye contact.
What the fuck was he doing over here? He looked pissed, too.
Her gun ready, she opened the door. “What the fuck do you want?” she asked at once.
