BELLA'S POV
"Good morning," he said.
His voice was directed forward. Toward the door. The even, controlled register of a man who was delivering a greeting to the general space rather than to the specific person in the pool eight feet to his left.
"Good morning," I said.
My voice echoed slightly in the vaulted room. That was the acoustic property of the pool space, surfaces that bounced sound, that gave everything an extra fraction of presence. Good morning from eight feet away in a high-ceilinged room had more texture than good morning at a breakfast table.
He reached the door.
He put his hand on it.
He stopped.
Not the fractional deceleration. Not the architectural almost-stop that I had catalogued from kitchen doorways and corridor junctions. A full, complete, visible stop, his h
