Chương 11
They would not investigate criminal conduct.
They would not identify the anonymous sender unless evidence emerged naturally through interviews or provided records.
Any suspicion of fraud would be referred to counsel.
That distinction mattered.
Eve added language protecting confidential employee interviews from being casually circulated among executives.
Legal objected.
She pushed back.
Lena supported her.
By midnight, they had a workable agreement.
At twelve-seventeen, a final email arrived from Adrian.
Thank you for doing this.
Nothing else.
Eve stared at it longer than necessary.
Then she typed, Thank Marianne.
She deleted that.
She typed, We’ll see what we find.
That sounded too ominous.
Finally she wrote, We start Wednesday.
His reply came one minute later.
Understood.
She put the phone facedown.
Sleep took nearly an hour.
On Tuesday morning, Eve returned to New York for less than a day.
Her apartment looked wrong before she even opened the door fully.
Preston’s shoes were gone from the mat.
The coat hook nearest the kitchen was empty.
The narrow table by the entrance held his keys.
He had placed them in a neat little ceramic bowl Eve bought in Beacon two summers ago.
She stood there with her suitcase behind her.
The silence felt staged.
She walked through the rooms slowly.
His record player was gone.
So were his books, his shaving kit, the blue blanket his mother gave them, and half the wineglasses because he had bought those before they moved in together.
He had left the ugly lamp.
Eve stared at it.
“You coward.”
The lamp remained unapologetic.
She laughed once and then unexpectedly started crying.
Not the airport collapse.
This was quieter.
She sat on the floor beside the couch and cried because the charging cable on his side table was gone.
Because there was only one toothbrush in the bathroom.
Because he had taken the small framed photograph of them at Nora’s wedding but left the nail in the wall.
She hated the nail most.
Her phone buzzed.
Nora.
Eve answered without speaking.
“Oh no.”
Eve wiped her face with her sleeve.
“What?”
“You’re crying.”
“How could you possibly know that?”
“You breathe like a congested pug.”
“That’s incredibly supportive.”
“Are you home?”
“Yes.”
“I’m coming over.”
“You have work.”
“I get off in forty minutes.”
“I’m fine.”
“Then I’m coming over to celebrate how fine you are.”
Eve did not argue.
Nora arrived carrying groceries and two plastic containers of something their mother used to make after funerals.
“What is that?”
“Baked ziti.”
“Why?”
“Because grief likes carbohydrates.”
“That is not medically sound.”
“I’m a nurse.”
“For children.”
“Children also eat pasta.”
Nora walked inside, looked around, and went still.
“He really took everything.”
“Not everything.”
Eve pointed at the lamp.
Nora stared.
“He left that?”
“Yes.”
“That is malicious.”
“Thank you.”
They ate standing at the kitchen counter because neither wanted to sit where Preston usually sat.
Nora asked no questions for almost ten minutes.
That was impressive for Nora.
Finally she said, “So tell me about the billionaire.”
Eve groaned.
“That transition was violent.”
“I gave you ten minutes.”
“He hired the agency for a project.”
“Of course he did.”
“Not because of the airport.”
“Sure.”
“Nora.”
“I’m listening.”
Eve explained Westbridge.
Not every detail.
Only enough to describe the assignment.
Nora’s expression changed when Eve mentioned Adrian’s wife.
“He still wears the ring?”
“Yes.”
“That’s sad.”
“It is.”
“And complicated.”
Eve looked at her.
“Why complicated?”
Nora gave her a long look.
“Because you noticed.”
Eve put down her fork.
“I noticed because he told me she died.”
“You noticed before that.”
“I was checking whether he was married.”
“Why?”
“Because I hugged him.”
“That does not require a marital status assessment.”
“It felt relevant afterward.”
Nora smiled faintly.
Eve pointed her fork at her.
“Do not make this into something.”
“I’m not.”
“You are.”
“I’m making it into a thing you’re defensive about.”
“I’m going to Westbridge tomorrow to interview employees about layoffs.”
“Okay.”
“He is a client.”
“Okay.”
“He is grieving.”
“Okay.”
“I just got dumped.”
“Very much okay.”
Eve narrowed her eyes.
Nora ate another bite of pasta.
“Why are you smiling?”
“Because you listed four reasons nothing is happening when I never said anything was.”
Eve hated sisters.
She especially hated older sisters.
She washed the dishes while Nora threw away expired yogurt from the refrigerator.
It was deeply irritating and exactly what Eve needed.
By nine, the apartment felt slightly less like a crime scene.
Nora left after extracting a promise that Eve would call from Massachusetts.
Eve packed again.
Before bed, she opened the drawer where she kept scarves and found the white handkerchief from JFK folded beneath them.
She had washed it at the hotel sink.
The mascara stains were gone.
The embroidered S remained.
She held it for a moment.
Then she put it back.
Wednesday morning, Eve drove west from Boston with Lena beside her and a junior analyst from Eve’s agency named Ravi Patel in the back seat.
Ravi had been briefed on the project, not on the airport.
Eve intended to keep it that way.
Lena drove because she claimed Eve’s habit of braking late caused spiritual distress.
“I brake normally.”
“You brake philosophically.”
“That sentence has no meaning.”
“It means I don’t trust you.”
Ravi looked up from his laptop.
“Should I be worried?”
“Only if she drives.”
Eve turned toward the window.
The city thinned into highway, then industrial towns, then stretches of bare trees and snow hardened gray along the shoulders.
About an hour outside Boston, Lena’s phone rang through the car.
She glanced at the screen mounted near the dashboard.
“Adrian.”
Eve looked at her.
“Answer.”
Lena tapped the steering-wheel control.
“Morning.”
Adrian’s voice filled the car.
“Where are you?”
“Near Worcester.”
“Is Eve driving?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Eve stared at the speaker.
“How do you know about that?”
Lena began laughing.
Adrian sounded almost pleased with himself.
“I asked Marianne.”
May you like
“You asked my boss about my driving?”
“She volunteered the information.”
