"You can stop smiling now. The guests are gone."
Kade's voice broke the silence the moment the bedroom door clicked shut behind them, and Ivy felt the practiced expression drop from her face like a mask she'd been holding in place too long. Her shoulders ached from hours of standing straight, of performing joy for a room full of strangers who would have killed her without hesitation an hour earlier if the price had been right, and her feet throbbed from heels she'd worn since morning.
"That's the first genuinely helpful thing you've said to me all night," she said, sinking onto the edge of a chair near the window, kicking off shoes that had been pinching for the last three hours, the relief almost embarrassing in how good it felt after a day that had asked so much of her, more than any s
