The house held the echo of the slap like a mistake it didn't know how to swallow. Eve stood in the hall with her hand on the banister and her cheek the color of new roses.
A maid rounded the corner, saw the mark, and froze. Eve lifted a palm. “It's fine," she said evenly. “Go to bed."
The maid nodded too fast and vanished. Eve waited until the quiet returned, then walked back to her room with a straight spine and a tray she didn't spill. She set it down carefully, sat on the edge of the bed, and stared at the place on the wall where the paint had a tiny ripple from when she and Evans had tried to hang a shelf and argued about whether the bubble was centered.
The door opened without knocking. Evans filled the frame, breath clipped, eyes wrong. “Eve," he said.
She didn't flinch. “You sho
