“Why is that?”
“I don’t think he’s very good.”
We laugh about that for a little. It eases some of the tension in my chest. Bree starts telling me more about Jake’s misadventures at the driving range when suddenly, I hear the pitter-patter of little girl footsteps on her end of the line.
Jo.
My heart leaps into my throat. She calls me Mommy when we talk. If she gets on the phone, it’ll be over. It’ll all come to light, the one secret I’ve worked so hard to keep hidden.
God only knows what’ll happen after that.
“Bree,” I say hurriedly, “say hi to the kids for me. Tell them I love them.”
But I’m too late. “Aunty Bree, who’s that?”
Jo’s voice, loud and clear.
Fuck.
“Watch out for my origami,” Bree warns my daughter, trying to deflect the question. “And no running in the house. Kids, will you go out and play please? I have some vacuuming to do in here.”
“Sounds chaotic in there,” I laugh nervously.
“Like a hurricane and an earthquake hit at the same time,” Bree sighs. “The kids are having their cousins over for a play date.”
I bite back my grin. Quick thinking on her part to explain away the “Aunty Bree” slip-up.
“No worries, I understand. I have to go anyway.”
“Call me again soon, okay? I really want to know how you’re doing.”
“I’m fine. You worry too much.”
“I’m your sister. It’s my job.”
“Love you.”
“Love you, too.”
Bree hangs up before I do. My heartbeat is still racing. I close my eyes and breathe until it’s receded before glancing at Isaak.
“Happy?” I ask, trying to muster up the right amount of indignation. “Juicy conversation, wasn’t it?”
“You don’t have another sibling, do you?” Isaak asks instead of answering my question.
I have to try super hard not to clam up and panic. “Uh, no. Just Bree.” But since I know where he’s going, I keep talking. “Her husband Jake has an older brother, though. He and his wife have a couple of kids.”
All lies. Jake’s an only child. The smallest amount of digging will reveal that, but I’m hoping Isaak will think this is too unimportant to look into. I can’t imagine him looking into Jake’s background.
At least, I hope that’s true.
“Sam and Mona,” I add. The devil is in the details.
Isaak nods like he’s satisfied. He turns to toy with the letter opener blade on his desk, spinning it slowly in his fingers. Then his eyes flit back up to mine.
“No goulash for dinner, huh?”
Damn. I lost. He noticed. Everything is fucked.
“Apparently not.”
“How long has that been your safe word?”
Fuck. Fuck. Fuck.
“Ever since you blew up my life six years ago,” I admit sheepishly. My shoulders sag forward in defeat.
Staring at Isaak now, I realize how much she looks like him. The dark brown hair, the strong cheekbones, the stubborn chin.
And her eyes, of course. Bright blue like her father’s.
“If you feel like your sister and her family are in danger,” he says solemnly, not blinking or looking away, “all you need to do is tell me. I’d make sure they were protected.”
“You… you would?”
“Of course. They don’t deserve to be caught up in all of this.”
“Then it’s best that you have no contact with any of them,” I say quickly. “Because apparently, whatever you touch becomes a target.”
I don’t mean that to come off so harsh. But my words slice through the air and turns the room cold.
“I… I didn’t mean that the way it sounded.”
“Didn’t you?” he asks, raising an eyebrow.
I wring my hands together. “I don’t know,” I say honestly.
Claiming otherwise would feel disingenuous. Maybe I did want it to hurt him. To share a little bit of my pain with the man who’s causing it, if nothing else.
“You’re close to your niece?”
I swallow and force myself to meet his gaze. I can’t be sheepish here. I need to be nonchalant. As cool and collected as Isaak is.
“She’s the youngest in the family,” I say weakly. “And she… she reminds me a lot of myself. I’ve missed her whole life. It makes me feel guilty.”
I’m closing in on dangerous territory, but talking about Jo, even if it has to be in code, feels good. A small acknowledgement of the truth.
The only downside is that I’m getting emotional. I swallow the lump in my throat and try to stop acting like a mother. Is that even possible, though? Once you’ve had a child, can you be anything else but their mother?
“Guilty?”
I shrug. “It’s not rational,” I say quickly. “But that’s just how I feel. My sister and I have always been incredibly close. I loved all her children before they even got here.”
When I look at him, he’s giving me a strange, faraway smile.
“What’s so funny?”
He shakes his head. “I was just thinking about my own aunt.”
“Maxim’s mother?”
He nods. “She wasn’t exactly the doting kind. But then again, she does believe that my father killed her husband.”
I raise my eyebrows. “We grew up in very different worlds.”
He smirks. “Very.”
“What was your childhood like?” I ask suddenly.
There’s a wary little voice in the back of my head warning me against this conversation. The more I learn about him, the more I know him. He’ll start transforming from a caricature of a villain into a three-dimensional person.
He’ll stop being the beast, and turn into a man.
I fear I’m falling down the rabbit hole as it is.
But the question is out there now, and I can’t take it back.
“It was… unique,” he replies.
“Wow,” I drawl sarcastically. “Thanks for the generous detail. Really paints a picture.”
What am I doing? I shouldn’t even want details. His life is none of my business. Just like my life is none of his.
“You wouldn’t be able to relate to my childhood,” he says.
I snort. “You wouldn’t be able to relate to mine, either. Growing up in the Midwest can kind of feel like a test of survival.”
He laughs. “Maybe we can relate to each other more than we think, then.”
We look at each other for a moment, both smiling. And in the space of a single breath, it happens. Like the flicker of an optical illusion, when you see the hidden picture for the first time and you can never go back to the old way again.
In that breath, he doesn’t look like the Beast who ruined my world.
He just looks like Isaak.
I wrench myself out of it with an angry snarl. Here I am, sitting opposite my prison warden, sharing stories about childhood and smiling? Why?
Because he has the most beautifully intense eyes I’ve ever seen?
Because his smile makes my stomach do backflips?
Because the memory of his lips are still hot on my body?
I am freaking pathetic in every sense of the word. Jo March would be ashamed. I’m ashamed.
“Where’d you go?” he asks.
I focus on him. “What?”
“You just went someplace dark.”
My eyes narrow into slits. “My head is the only private space I have left. So I’d rather keep my thoughts to myself, if that’s okay with you.”
He looks amused. “Careful. You’re giving me whiplash.”