But it still feels like there’s an even truer answer, and I owe it to myself—and Eden—to give it.
“I met someone,” I say. “A woman.”
Chun snorts again and gives Evelyn a knowing look. “Told you,” she says.
Matias stares at me. I’ve stunned him. “You told me you weren’t seeing anyone.”
“I wasn’t, exactly, yet…at that point. I didn’t think it was going to—happen.”
“DoesMANhattanmagazine know that the mighty Rhys Hott has fallen?” Matias demands.
I laugh. “Not yet, but I’m sure I won’t be able to keep it a secret for long.”
Chun gives me a skeptical look. “And if things don’t work out between you?”
I think of Preston, scowling and fierce. Of all three of my brothers: Quinn, grumpy and withdrawn; Shane, pretending not to give a shit about anyone or anything; Preston, working so fucking hard to atone for whatever it was he believed he’d done wrong.
I think of them now. Lighter. Brighter. Better.
Preston’s words:What do you do for a living?
Sometimes you have to be reminded of who you are.
“Things will work out between us,” I say.
“Awfully sure of yourself,” she says.
Good thing they didn’t see me earlier today with my face in the pillow. But I’ve been a lawyer a long time. There’s no one who doesn’t get knocked down from time to time. The question is alwaysWhat do you do when you get up again?
“You’ve read the articles,” I say. “You did the research. Anyone you talk to say I’m someone who gives up a fight before it’s won?”
Grins and nods from—I hope—my future partners.
“And now, if you’ll excuse me? There’s somewhere I need to be.”
50
Eden
I’m ordering fabric online when Rhys walks into the shop.
I haven’t seen him since four nights ago, when I told him I didn’t think we could work.
Since then, I’ve clung to the feeling I wrapped around myself. Strong. Safe. Like impenetrable armor. No one else can make me safe—not mother, not father, not grandmother, not husband, not fiancé, and definitely not…whatever Rhys is.Only I can make myselfsafe.
I can refuse to set myself up to be left again.
“Hey,” he says.
I look up.
He’s beautiful. In another era he would have been an actual warrior instead of a fighter for marital justice. He would have had a sword in a scabbard and a dagger at his calf, but he would have worn exactly that same expression—Don’t fuck with me.
Despite myself, despite all my resolve, I shiver and my body warms, and against all good sense, I want him to be my warrior. The man who’ll fightfor me.
And that’s exactly what I can’t want, it’s exactly what I need to walk away from.
I realize I’ve reflexively picked up my rotary cutter, the blade winking in a shaft of morning sunlight, and I set it down again. He doesn’t actually have a sword. I don’t need to literally keep myself safe from him. I just need to not fall for whatever speech he’s about to give me. He went to law school to learn how to get people to do what he wants them to.
