Vivienne's POV
I stood at the window.
I didn't plan to go there. My body just made the decision before my mind caught up and I was standing at the glass looking at the city below with my hands at my sides and the shaking in them slowly moving up through my arms into my chest.
Charles didn't follow me.
He stayed at the counter. I could feel him behind me the way you felt a presence that was being deliberately still, giving you the room you needed without disappearing from it.
I looked at the city.
And my mother's voice came.
....
Not as a memory exactly.
More like a tide. Starting somewhere deep and rising slowly through everything, carrying pieces with it as it climbed.
I was six years old and she was tucking me in and I asked her why we didn't have a daddy and she was quiet for
