43
It was dawn when Ava woke on Jaime’s dignified Sofa with refreshed anxiety: Mat had been lying to her. The run-in with Amir repeated itself in her mind as she folded the Cool Sheets, washed her Thoughtful Glass, and left Jaime a note thanking him. She couldn’t make sense of it all, which felt even worse than the lies themselves. She clicked Brutus onto his Curious Leash and closed the door quietly behind her.
In the Swyft home, her head felt heavy, as though it were full of sand. An ache throbbed above her eye. Brutus sat next to her, panting out the open window. She envisioned Mat standing outside her building, waiting for her to come home, but to her relief, he wasn’t. ‘Let’s go,’ she said to Brutus, pulling him out of the car. As she pushed her way inside, it occurred to her that M
