Chương 2
With disbelief.
As if they had already made a private agreement simply by surviving the same ugly moment.
Nora shifted one hand beneath the carrier.
“Yes.”
Ethan went still.
Lydia shook her head. “That’s not what happened.”
Nora’s skin prickled.
“You pushed me into a car.”
“You came at me.”
“I was holding a diaper bag.”
“You were pointing in my face.”
“I was holding a diaper bag and a discharge folder.”
“You were shouting.”
“I asked you to get away from me.”
“You threatened me.”
Nora stared at her.
“I said I was going to call Ethan.”
Lydia’s eyes flicked toward her brother.
Nora heard the baby breathe.
Ethan said, “When?”
“Tuesday.”
His face tightened.
Tuesday was the day Nora and the baby had been discharged.
The day Ethan had waited outside her building for almost an hour because Nora had texted that she needed to sleep and didn’t want company.
The day he had sent six messages and then, unlike most men Nora had known, stopped sending them when she asked him to.
He turned to Lydia.
“You went to the hospital?”
“I went to talk to her.”
“You told me you were in Richmond.”
“I was in Richmond that morning.”
“You said you were there all day.”
“Oh my God, Ethan.”
It came out with a flash of the old Lydia—impatient, certain, almost offended by the need to account for herself.
Then she looked at Nora’s bruises again.
The certainty disappeared.
Ethan reached into his jacket.
Nora knew what he was doing before the phone appeared.
“Don’t,” she said.
His thumb stopped above the screen.
Lydia looked between them.
Ethan said, “She assaulted you twice.”
“I know.”
“I’m calling the police.”
“No.”
“Nora.”
“Not while I’m standing in your hallway with a five-day-old baby.”
“You think that makes it less serious?”
“I think it makes me tired.”
A long second passed.
It was not a good answer, but it was hers.
Ethan lowered the phone.
Lydia exhaled through her nose.
Nora noticed and immediately hated that she had noticed.
“This isn’t for you,” Nora told her.
“I didn’t say anything.”
“You didn’t have to.”
Lydia stared at her.
Ethan stepped farther aside until he was no longer standing between them like a wall but close enough to intervene if either woman moved.
He looked at Nora.
“Do you want her to leave?”
Nora almost laughed.
The question was so small compared with everything around it.
The house belonged to Ethan. Lydia had grown up in it. Nora had been inside three times.
Once for a winter dinner at which Lydia spent forty minutes describing the difference between a charitable grant and what she called emotional charity.
Once when Ethan’s father was dying and Nora had sat outside the study because Ethan had not wanted to be alone.
And today.
She looked toward the front door.
Her overnight bag sat beside the console table where she had dropped it when Lydia intercepted her.
The blue baby blanket she had tucked into the side pocket was dragging on the floor.
“Yes,” Nora said.
Lydia blinked.
Ethan nodded once.
“Leave.”
“You’re throwing me out of my own house.”
“It hasn’t been your house since Dad changed the trust.”
The sentence landed badly.
Ethan knew it as soon as he said it.
Lydia’s face closed.
Nora looked at him.
That was the first thing he had done since entering the hallway that she disliked.
It was easy to use the right weapon when you knew where someone kept the wound.
Ethan seemed to see the same thing reflected in Nora’s expression.
He rubbed his thumb against the edge of his phone.
“Forget that,” he said. “That was cheap.”
Lydia gave a small laugh.
“There he is.”
“Leave because Nora asked you to.”
“Now she makes the rules?”
“In relation to herself and the baby? Yes.”
“Your baby,” Lydia said.
Ethan’s eyes sharpened.
Lydia looked at Nora again. “That’s what she says.”
Nora felt something inside her go quiet.
Not angry.
Finished.
Ethan did not defend her immediately.
That surprised all three of them.
He merely watched Lydia.
Lydia tried to hold his gaze.
“You took a paternity test,” she said. “Right?”
Ethan’s expression did not change.
“That’s none of your business.”
“So you didn’t.”
Nora shifted her weight.
Her shoulder throbbed.
The baby was becoming warm against her chest, and she could feel the first restless motion that meant he would wake soon.
She looked toward the guest room corridor.
Ethan noticed.
“Go sit down.”
“I’m fine.”
“You’re leaning.”
“I’m wearing a person.”
A strange little sound escaped Ethan.
It might have been a laugh under different circumstances.
Nora almost smiled and hated herself for it.
Lydia watched them.
Something in her expression turned brittle.
“You think this is funny?”
“No,” Nora said. “I think my back hurts.”
“I’m trying to keep my brother from destroying his life.”
Ethan answered before Nora could.
“My life is not yours to preserve.”
“That’s a nice sentence.”
“Lydia.”
“No, say it again. Maybe slower this time. Pretend you didn’t spend the last fifteen years calling me every time there was a problem you didn’t want Dad to know about.”
Ethan’s face changed.
Not enough to satisfy her, apparently.
“You remember Denver?” she asked.
“Don’t.”
“You remember the girl from Georgetown?”
“Stop.”
“The DUI you somehow decided wasn’t a family problem?”
“I was twenty-three.”
“And I was twenty.”
Nora looked at Ethan.
He did not look back.
Lydia’s laugh was quieter now.
“You trained me to clean things up, Ethan. You and Dad both did. Then you get to turn around and be offended because I kept doing what you taught me.”
“That doesn’t explain putting your hands on her.”
“No.”
“Doesn’t explain threatening her.”
“I didn’t threaten her.”
Nora said, “You told me my lease could become a problem.”
Lydia shut her eyes.
Ethan looked slowly toward his sister.
“What?”
May you like
“That is not what I said.”
“You said,” Nora continued, “‘It would be unfortunate if your landlord discovered how many people are actually staying there.’”
