For a moment he simply looked at me.
I knew that look.
It was the one he wore when a scene had slipped off script and he had not yet decided whether to fix it with charm, anger, or touch.
"You're overreacting," he said finally.
So he had chosen insult first.
Interesting.
I let the silence sit between us until it started doing the work my voice no longer needed to do.
Outside the glass, the city glittered with the bored confidence of a place that never noticed one private life ending unless it happened loudly enough to interrupt lunch.
"Ivy," Auston said, quieter now. "Look at me."
I was looking at him.
That seemed to unsettle him more than if I had refused.
"This has gone too far," he said. "You disappear, you go to ground in another man's house, and suddenly people are calling
