Chapter 21
NORA
I excused myself when the plates were cleared, telling them both I needed the bathroom, keeping my voice easy and light all the way up the stairs. I closed the door behind me and turned the lock, and only once the click sounded did I let my face finally fall out of its careful shape, my shoulders dropping, my breath leaving me in one long, shaking exhale.
I gripped the edge of the sink and looked at myself in the mirror, checking that nothing on my face had cracked downstairs, that the mask had held the whole time even when it hadn't felt like it from the inside. I looked steady enough. Tired around the eyes, maybe, but steady.
I heard voices through the floor a moment later, muffled, sharp enough in tone that I could tell even without hearing the words that something b
