“Recommend?”
“Yes.”
“And if I refuse?”
“Then I show you the study.”
That answer removed the fight from me.
Teresa brought tea and a plate of small pastries. She placed them on the table and left.
Niko poured for both of us.
I remained standing.
He held out a cup.
“You should eat.”
“I’m not hungry.”
“You barely touched dinner.”
“You watched?”
“I notice things.”
“You noticed photographs. You did not notice me.”
His hand paused.
The words had come from somewhere deeper than I intended.
He set the cup down.
“What should I have noticed?”
“That I was not enjoying myself in those photographs. That I left parties early. That Stella was in nearly every picture because I never went alone. That I smiled when cameras appeared because my father taught me people invent worse stories when you look unhappy.”
Niko’s expression became still.
“I saw what I expected to see,” he said.
