Wait­ing ai

Wait­ing ai

Novem­ber 2, 2010—I knew we were head­ed for a bad night. I watched the returns
come in from the Treaty Room, my usu­al elec­tion-night perch, Valerie and Axe and
Gibbs with me. It was not the blood­bath that some had predicted—thank you,
consistency!—but as the evening wore on, it was clear that we were los­ing the House
of Rep­re­sen­ta­tives. By the time I went to bed, Repub­li­cans had picked up at least six­ty-
three seats, more than enough for a major­i­ty.
To say I was dis­cour­aged would be an under­state­ment. Yes, we had man­aged to hold
on to the Sen­ate, but just bare­ly, los­ing six seats to end up with a slim fifty-three-to-
forty-sev­en major­i­ty. And while we’d picked up a few gov­er­nor­ships in key states, the
Repub­li­cans’ gains were wide­spread and deep, giv­ing them full con­trol of at least
twen­ty-one state leg­is­la­tures.
As I lay awake in the ear­ly hours of Novem­ber 3, run­ning through what I could
have done dif­fer­ent­ly, what my admin­is­tra­tion might have accom­plished if we’d had
two more years with Democ­rats in con­trol of Congress—how much more dif­fi­cult it
was going to be to move any part of our agen­da forward—I couldn’t shake the feel­ing
that I had let down mil­lions of Amer­i­cans who had invest­ed their hopes in me. And
there was no get­ting around the harsh truth: With Repub­li­cans now run­ning the House,
and their lead­ers appar­ent­ly deter­mined to oppose and obstruct our ideas at every turn,
it was going to be a long, tough slog to the end of my first term.
The next day, I stood before the cam­eras in the East Room to address the elec­tion
results. Reporters seemed to take sat­is­fac­tion in point­ing out that we’d expe­ri­enced a
“shel­lack­ing.” I didn’t blame them; that’s how it felt to me too. I acknowl­edged the
anger and frus­tra­tion that vot­ers had expressed, and I took respon­si­bil­i­ty for not doing
a good enough job in deliv­er­ing the changes they had hoped for. I spoke about the
need for both par­ties to find com­mon ground, to work togeth­er in the best inter­ests of
the Amer­i­can peo­ple.
It all sound­ed rea­son­able enough. Yet as I field­ed ques­tions, I had to work not to let
my frus­tra­tion show. Not just with the inane premise of so many ques­tions being hurled
at me—that some­how this elec­tion had been a ref­er­en­dum on Big Gov­ern­ment, when
it was clear to any­one who had fol­lowed these past two years close­ly that our biggest
prob­lem hadn’t been an over­abun­dance of gov­ern­ment activism but rather our inabil­i­ty
to do more to direct­ly help ordi­nary people—but also with myself, for all the
oppor­tu­ni­ties I felt I had squan­dered and all the polit­i­cal cap­i­tal I had let slip away in
the after­glow of our elec­tion, for how slow I had been to adjust to the pace of change in
this hyper­con­nect­ed, hyper­po­lar­ized cli­mate. I felt as if I had reached a dead end,
with­out a clear sense of how to move for­ward.
“No dra­ma Oba­ma,” Axe would remind me when­ev­er he saw me brood­ing
fol­low­ing a set­back. True to form, by the time I’d retreat­ed to the Oval after the press
con­fer­ence, I had start­ed to regain my equi­lib­ri­um. Maybe we’d lost the House, but we
still had the Sen­ate; maybe progress would be slow­er than I would have liked, but there
was still plen­ty that could get done—an immi­gra­tion bill, per­haps, or a mod­est
infra­struc­ture pro­gram. Who knew? Maybe there were enough Repub­li­cans who, now
that they shared gov­ern­ing respon­si­bil­i­ties, would be more will­ing to bar­gain.
More than any­thing, though, look­ing out the Oval’s win­dows onto the sun­lit South
Lawn, what con­soled me was some­thing Michelle had said to me not long after the
elec­tion results had come in. It was what I always tell myself when­ev­er life around the
White House starts feel­ing a bit too heavy.
“For bet­ter or worse,” she’d said, tak­ing my hand, her eyes bright and teas­ing, “we
still have each oth­er.”
Michelle always knows just what to say.

Chap­ter 23 sees the pro­tag­o­nist, Feyre, spend­ing an idyl­lic after­noon in a lush, nat­ur­al glen along­side Tam­lin, far removed from the mag­i­cal won­ders that usu­al­ly define his enchant­ed for­est. Unlike the mys­ti­cal spec­ta­cles they’ve encoun­tered before, this set­ting is sim­ple yet serene, watched over by a wil­low tree whose branch­es soft­ly sing in the breeze—a fea­ture Feyre ini­tial­ly can­not per­ceive due to her human sens­es.

Tam­lin, the High Lord, reveals that he can grant Feyre the abil­i­ty to expe­ri­ence the world as the Fae do—to see, hear, smell, and taste it in all its mag­i­cal com­plex­i­ty. The price for such a gift, how­ev­er, is a kiss. Feyre reluc­tant­ly agrees, dri­ven by a mix of curios­i­ty and the bur­geon­ing con­nec­tion between her and Tam­lin. Upon receiv­ing the kiss­es on her eye­lids, the world around her trans­forms, reveal­ing its true mag­i­cal essence in a sym­pho­ny of sounds, sights, and scents that leave her awestruck. The brook in their vicin­i­ty shim­mers with rain­bow hues, the trees glow with an inner light, and the mag­ic in the air is as tan­gi­ble as the scent of flow­ers.

This expe­ri­ence also changes her per­cep­tion of Tam­lin. Once the glam­our cloak­ing his true form is tem­porar­i­ly lift­ed, she sees him not just as the High Lord he is but as the epit­o­me of Fae beau­ty and pow­er, his appear­ance a daz­zling array of col­ors and gold­en light. His mask, how­ev­er, remains immutable, a sym­bol of the curse that binds him and a bar­ri­er that Feyre wish­es to over­come, not just to sat­is­fy her curios­i­ty but to deep­en the con­nec­tion they share.

The chap­ter con­cludes with a gen­tle moment of cama­raderie and bud­ding inti­ma­cy between Feyre and Tam­lin, punc­tu­at­ed by a humor­ous­ly exe­cut­ed promise for a kiss, which Feyre play­ful­ly deliv­ers on the back of Tam­lin’s hand. As the day fades, Tamlin’s laugh­ter blends with the nat­ur­al har­mo­ny around them, lur­ing Feyre into a peace­ful slum­ber in the idyl­lic glen, her rest safe­guard­ed by the High Lord’s pres­ence.

This seg­ment beau­ti­ful­ly melds ele­ments of whim­sy, romance, and a deep­er, almost spir­i­tu­al con­nec­tion with the nat­ur­al world, under­scor­ing the evolv­ing rela­tion­ship between Feyre and Tam­lin. Through their inter­ac­tions and the mag­i­cal rev­e­la­tions Feyre expe­ri­ences, the chap­ter vivid­ly por­trays the won­der of the Fae realm and the com­plex­i­ties of Feyre’s jour­ney in it, both in terms of her per­son­al growth and her deep­en­ing bond with Tam­lin.

In the midst of esca­lat­ing ten­sions in Bai­leyville, the small town turns into a bat­tle­ground divid­ed by the immi­nent tri­al of Margery O’Hare, accused of a grave crime. The pres­ence of McCul­lough’s extend­ed fam­i­ly and grow­ing pub­lic unrest exac­er­bate the sit­u­a­tion, cre­at­ing an envi­ron­ment of hos­til­i­ty towards Margery and those asso­ci­at­ed with the Pack­horse Library. Amidst this tur­moil, per­son­al con­flicts and alle­giances emerge stark­ly. Fred’s pro­tec­tive stance, Sven’s depar­ture to a life of soli­tude, and Alice’s plans to return to Eng­land reflect the deep emo­tion­al toll the con­tro­ver­sy takes on them.

Alice, prepar­ing for her depar­ture, seg­re­gates her belong­ings, sym­bol­i­cal­ly dis­tanc­ing her­self from her past life and the sour­ing real­i­ty in Bai­leyville. The library, serv­ing as a haven for the women, becomes the scene of Alice’s announce­ment of her depar­ture, stir­ring a mix of dis­be­lief and con­cern among the group. The librar­i­ans’ sol­i­dar­i­ty is test­ed as they nav­i­gate their per­son­al despair and the soci­etal back­lash against their mis­sion.

As the tri­al looms, Bai­leyville descends fur­ther into chaos, marked by inflam­ma­to­ry jour­nal­ism, pub­lic demon­stra­tions, and a pal­pa­ble sense of injus­tice. Unex­pect­ed­ly, the town’s divi­sive mood cul­mi­nates out­side the jail­house, where Margery is being held. In a moment of pro­found uni­ty and defi­ance, Izzy Brady, sup­port­ed by her col­leagues and town res­i­dents, con­fronts the mob with a hymn. Their col­lec­tive singing acts as a pow­er­ful rebuke to the hatred and a poignant affir­ma­tion of their com­mu­ni­ty’s resilience.

This chap­ter poignant­ly cap­tures the trans­for­ma­tive pow­er of sol­i­dar­i­ty in the face of adver­si­ty. The pub­lic’s ini­tial ani­mos­i­ty is stark­ly con­trast­ed with the librar­i­ans’ and their allies’ courage to stand up for their con­vic­tions. Through their actions, they not only chal­lenge soci­etal norms but also sow the seeds of change in Bai­leyville’s col­lec­tive con­science. Margery, in her dark­est hour, is giv­en a glim­mer of hope through their defi­ant act of kind­ness, illus­trat­ing the endur­ing strength of the human spir­it.

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

TWENTY-THREE
On Sun­day after­noon, I get two pieces of good news:
First, Andrew man­aged to refund the tick­ets and I won’t have to work
for free.
Sec­ond, Cecelia is going to be gone for two whole weeks.
I’m not sure which of these rev­e­la­tions I’m hap­pi­er about. I’m glad I
don’t have to shell out mon­ey for the tick­ets. But I’m even hap­pi­er that I
don’t have to wait on Cecelia any­more. The apple doesn’t fall far from the
tree with that one.
Cecelia has packed enough lug­gage to last her at least one year. I swear
to God, it’s like she’s put every­thing she owns in those bags, and then if
there was any space left, she filled it with rocks. That’s how it feels as I’m
car­ry­ing the bags out to Nina’s Lexus.
“Please be care­ful with that, Mil­lie.” Nina watch­es me fret­ful­ly as I
sum­mon super­hu­man strength to lift the bags into her trunk. My palms are
bright red from where I was hold­ing the straps. “Please don’t break
any­thing.”
What could Cecelia pos­si­bly be car­ry­ing to camp that’s so frag­ile?
Don’t they most­ly just bring cloth­ing and books and bug spray? But far be it
from me to ques­tion her. “Sor­ry.”
When I get back in the house to retrieve the last of Cecelia’s bags, I
catch Andrew jog­ging down the stairs. He catch­es me about to lift the
mon­strous piece of lug­gage and his eyes widen.
“Hey,” he says. “I’ll car­ry that for you. That looks real­ly heavy.”
“I’m fine,” I insist, only because Nina is com­ing out of the garage.
“Yes, she’s got it, Andy.” Nina wags a fin­ger. “You need to be care­ful
about your bad back.”
He shoots her a look. “My back is fine. Any­way, I want to say good­bye
to Cece.”
Nina pulls a face. “Are you sure you won’t come with us?”
“I wish I could,” he says. “But I can’t miss an entire day of work
tomor­row. I’ve got meet­ings in the after­noon.”
She sniffs. “You always put work first.”
He gri­maces. I don’t blame him for being hurt by her comment—as far
as I can tell, it’s com­plete­ly untrue. Despite being a suc­cess­ful busi­ness­man,
Andrew is home every sin­gle night for din­ner. He does occa­sion­al­ly go to
work on the week­ends, but he’s also attend­ed two dance recitals this month,
one piano recital, a fourth-grade grad­u­a­tion cer­e­mo­ny, a karate
demon­stra­tion, and one night they were gone for hours for some sort of art
show at the day school.
“I’m sor­ry,” he says any­way.
She sniffs again and turns her head. Andrew reach­es out to touch her
arm, but she jerks it away and dash­es to the kitchen to get her purse.
Instead, he heaves the last piece of lug­gage into his arms and goes out to
the garage to dump it in the trunk and say good­bye to Cecelia, who is sit­ting
in Nina’s snow-col­ored Lexus, wear­ing a lacy white dress that is wild­ly
inap­pro­pri­ate for sum­mer camp. Not that I would ever say any­thing.
Two whole weeks with­out that lit­tle mon­ster. I want to jump with joy.
But instead, I turn my lips down. “It will be sad with­out Cecelia here this
month,” I say as Nina comes back out of the kitchen.
“Real­ly?” she says dry­ly. “I thought you couldn’t stand her.”
My jaw drops open. I mean, yes, she’s right that Cecelia and I have not
hit it off. But I didn’t real­ize she knew I felt that way. If she knows that,
does she real­ize I’m not a big fan of Nina her­self either?
Nina smooths down her white blouse and goes back out to the garage.
As soon as she leaves the room, it’s like all the ten­sion has been sucked out
of me. I always feel on edge when Nina is around. It’s like she’s dis­sect­ing
every­thing I do.
Andrew emerges from the garage, wip­ing his hands on his jeans. I love
how he wears a T‑shirt and jeans on the week­ends. I love the way his hair
gets tou­sled when he’s doing phys­i­cal activ­i­ty. I love the way he smiles and
winks at me.
I won­der if he feels the same way I do about Nina leav­ing.
“So,” he says, “now that Nina is gone, I have a con­fes­sion to make.”
“Oh?”
A con­fes­sion? I’m mad­ly in love with you. I’m going to leave Nina so
we can run off togeth­er to Aru­ba.
Nah, not too like­ly.
“I couldn’t get a refund on those show tick­ets.” He hangs his head. “I
didn’t want Nina to give you a hard time over it. Or try to charge you, for
Christ’s sake. I’m sure she was the one who told you the wrong date.”
I nod slow­ly. “Yes, she did, but… Well, any­way, thank you. I appre­ci­ate
it.”
“So… I mean, you should take the tick­ets. Go to the city tonight and see
the show with a friend. And you can stay at The Plaza hotel room
overnight.”
I almost gasp. “That’s so gen­er­ous.”
The right side of his lips quirks up. “Well, we’ve got the tick­ets. Why
should they go to waste? Enjoy it.”
“Yeah…” I toy with the hem of my T‑shirt, think­ing. I can’t imag­ine
what Nina would say if she found out. And I have to admit, just the thought
of going gives me anx­i­ety. “I appre­ci­ate the ges­ture, but I’ll pass on the
show.”
“Real­ly? This is sup­posed to be the best show of the decade! You don’t
like going to shows on Broad­way?”
He has no idea about my life—what I’ve been doing for the last decade.
“I’ve nev­er even been to a show on Broad­way.”
“Then you need to go! I insist!”
“Right, but…” I take a deep breath. “The truth is, I don’t have any­one to
go with. And I don’t feel like going alone. So like I said, I’ll pass.”
Andrew stares at me for a moment, rub­bing his fin­ger against the slight
stub­ble on his jaw. Final­ly, he says, “I’ll go with you.”
I raise my eye­brows. “Are you sure that’s a good idea?”
He hes­i­tates. “I know Nina has jeal­ousy issues, but that’s no rea­son to
let these expen­sive tick­ets go to waste. And it’s a crime you’ve nev­er seen a
show on Broad­way before. It’ll be fun.”
Yes, it will be fun. That’s what I’m wor­ried about, damn it.
I imag­ine my evening unfold­ing. Dri­ving out to Man­hat­tan in Andrew’s
BMW, sit­ting in the orches­tra for one of the hottest shows on Broad­way,

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

CHAPTER
23
It had been a year since I had stalked through that labyrinth of snow and ice
and killed a faerie with hate in my heart.
My family’s emer­ald-roofed estate was as love­ly at the end of win­ter as it
had been in the sum­mer. A dif­fer­ent sort of beau­ty, though—the pale mar­ble
seemed warm against the stark snow piled high across the land, and bits of
ever­green and hol­ly adorned the win­dows, the arch­ways, and the lamp­posts.
The only bit of dec­o­ra­tion, of cel­e­bra­tion, humans both­ered with. Not when
they’d banned and con­demned every hol­i­day after the War, all a reminder of
their immor­tal over­seers.
Three months with Ama­ran­tha had destroyed me. I couldn’t begin to
imag­ine what mil­len­nia with High Fae like her might do—the scars it’d
leave on a cul­ture, a peo­ple.
My people—or so they had once been.
Hood up, fin­gers tucked into the fur-lined pock­ets of my cloak, I stood
before the dou­ble doors of the house, lis­ten­ing to the clear ring­ing of the
bell I’d pulled a heart­beat before.
Behind me, hid­den by Rhys’s glam­ours, my three com­pan­ions wait­ed,
unseen.
I’d told them it would be best if I spoke to my fam­i­ly first. Alone.
I shiv­ered, crav­ing the mod­er­ate win­ter of Velaris, won­der­ing how it
could be so tem­per­ate in the far north, but … every­thing in Pry­thi­an was
strange. Per­haps when the wall hadn’t exist­ed, when mag­ic had flowed
freely between realms, the sea­son­al dif­fer­ences hadn’t been so vast.
The door opened, and a mer­ry-faced, round housekeeper—Mrs. Lau­rent,
I recalled—squinted at me. “May I help … ” The words trailed off as she
noticed my face.
With the hood on, my ears and crown were hid­den, but that glow, that
preter­nat­ur­al still­ness … She didn’t open the door wider.
“I’m here to see my fam­i­ly,” I choked out.
“Your—your father is away on busi­ness, but your sis­ters … ” She didn’t
move.
She knew. She could tell there was some­thing dif­fer­ent, some­thing off—
Her eyes dart­ed around me. No car­riage, no horse.
No foot­prints through the snow.
Her face blanched, and I cursed myself for not think­ing of it—
“Mrs. Lau­rent?”
Some­thing in my chest broke at Elain’s voice from the hall behind her.
At the sweet­ness and youth and kind­ness, untouched by Pry­thi­an,
unaware of what I’d done, become—
I backed away a step. I couldn’t do this. Couldn’t bring this upon them.
Then Elain’s face appeared over Mrs. Laurent’s round shoul­der.
Beautiful—she’d always been the most beau­ti­ful of us. Soft and love­ly,
like a sum­mer dawn.
Elain was exact­ly as I’d remem­bered her, the way I’d made myself
remem­ber her in those dun­geons, when I told myself that if I failed, if
Ama­ran­tha crossed the wall, she’d be next. The way she’d be next if the
King of Hybern shat­tered the wall, if I didn’t get the Book of Breath­ings.
Elain’s gold­en-brown hair was half up, her pale skin creamy and flushed
with col­or, and her eyes, like molten choco­late, were wide as they took me
in.
They filled with tears and silent­ly over­ran, spilling down those love­ly
cheeks.
Mrs. Lau­rent didn’t yield an inch. She’d shut this door in my face the
moment I so much as breathed wrong.
Elain lift­ed a slen­der hand to her mouth as her body shook with a sob.
“Elain,” I said hoarse­ly.
Foot­steps on the sweep­ing stairs behind them, then—
“Mrs. Lau­rent, draw up some tea and bring it to the draw­ing room.”
The house­keep­er looked to the stairs, then to Elain, then to me.
A phan­tom in the snow.
The woman mere­ly gave me a look that promised death if I harmed my
sis­ters as she turned into the house, leav­ing me before Elain, still qui­et­ly
cry­ing.
But I took a step over the thresh­old and looked up the stair­case.
To where Nes­ta stood, a hand braced on the rail, star­ing as if I were a
ghost.
The house was beau­ti­ful, but there was some­thing untouched about it.
Some­thing new, com­pared to the age and worn love of Rhys’s homes in
Velaris.
And seat­ed before the carved mar­ble sit­ting room hearth, my hood on,
hands out­stretched toward the roar­ing fire, I felt … felt like they had let in a
wolf.
A wraith.
I had become too big for these rooms, for this frag­ile mor­tal life, too
stained and wild and … pow­er­ful. And I was about to bring that
per­ma­nent­ly into their lives as well.
Where Rhys, Cass­ian, and Azriel were, I didn’t know. Per­haps they stood
as shad­ows in the cor­ner, watch­ing. Per­haps they’d remained out­side in the
snow. I wouldn’t put it past Cass­ian and Azriel to be now fly­ing the
grounds, inspect­ing the lay­out, mak­ing wider cir­cles until they reached the
vil­lage, my ram­shackle old cot­tage, or maybe even the for­est itself.
Nes­ta looked the same. But old­er. Not in her face, which was as grave
and stun­ning as before, but … in her eyes, in the way she car­ried her­self.
Seat­ed across from me on a small sofa, my sis­ters stared—and wait­ed.
I said, “Where is Father?” It felt like the only safe thing to say.
“In Neva,” Nes­ta said, nam­ing one of the largest cities on the con­ti­nent.
“Trad­ing with some mer­chants from the oth­er half of the world. And
attend­ing a sum­mit about the threat above the wall. A threat I won­der if
you’ve come back to warn us about.”
No words of relief, of love—never from her.
Elain lift­ed her teacup. “What­ev­er the rea­son, Feyre, we are hap­py to see
you. Alive. We thought you were—”
I pulled my hood back before she could go on.
Elain’s teacup rat­tled in its saucer as she noticed my ears. My longer,
slen­der hands—the face that was unde­ni­ably Fae.
“I was dead,” I said rough­ly. “I was dead, and then I was reborn—
remade.”
Elain set her shiv­er­ing teacup onto the low-lying table between us.
Amber liq­uid splashed over the side, pool­ing in the saucer.
And as she moved, Nes­ta angled herself—ever so slight­ly. Between me
and Elain.
It was Nesta’s gaze I held as I said, “I need you to lis­ten.”
They were both wide-eyed.
But they did.
I told them my sto­ry. In as much detail as I could endure, I told them of
Under the Moun­tain. Of my tri­als. And Ama­ran­tha. I told them about death.
And rebirth.
Explain­ing the last few months, how­ev­er, was hard­er.
So I kept it brief.
But I explained what need­ed to hap­pen here—the threat Hybern posed. I
explained what this house need­ed to be, what we need­ed to be, and what I
need­ed from them.
And when I fin­ished, they remained wide-eyed. Silent.
It was Elain who at last said, “You—you want oth­er High Fae to come …
here. And … and the Queens of the Realm.”
I nod­ded slow­ly.
“Find some­where else,” Nes­ta said.
I turned to her, already plead­ing, brac­ing for a fight.
“Find some­where else,” Nes­ta said again, straight-backed. “I don’t want
them in my house. Or near Elain.”
“Nes­ta, please,” I breathed. “There is nowhere else; nowhere I can go
with­out some­one hunt­ing me, cru­ci­fy­ing me—”
“And what of us? When the peo­ple around here learn we’re Fae
sym­pa­thiz­ers? Are we any bet­ter than the Chil­dren of the Blessed, then?
Any stand­ing, any influ­ence we have—gone. And Elain’s wed­ding—”
“Wed­ding,” I blurt­ed.
I hadn’t noticed the pearl-and-dia­mond ring on her fin­ger, the dark met­al
band glint­ing in the fire­light.
Elain’s face was pale, though, as she looked at it.
“In five months,” Nes­ta said. “She’s mar­ry­ing a lord’s son. And his father
has devot­ed his life to hunt­ing down your kind when they cross the wall.”
Your kind.
“So there will be no meet­ing here,” Nes­ta said, shoul­ders stiff. “There
will be no Fae in this house.”
“Do you include me in that dec­la­ra­tion?” I said qui­et­ly.
Nesta’s silence was answer enough.
But Elain said, “Nes­ta.”
Slow­ly, my eldest sis­ter looked at her.
“Nes­ta,” Elain said again, twist­ing her hands. “If … if we do not help
Feyre, there won’t be a wed­ding. Even Lord Nolan’s bat­tle­ments and all his
men, couldn’t save me from … from them.” Nes­ta didn’t so much as flinch.
Elain pushed, “We keep it secret—we send the ser­vants away. With the
spring approach­ing, they’ll be glad to go home. And if Feyre needs to be in
and out for meet­ings, she’ll send word ahead, and we’ll clear them out.
Make up excus­es to send them on hol­i­days. Father won’t be back until the
sum­mer, any­way. No one will know.” She put a hand on Nesta’s knee, the
pur­ple of my sister’s gown near­ly swal­low­ing up the ivory hand. “Feyre
gave and gave—for years. Let us now help her. Help … oth­ers.”
My throat was tight, and my eyes burned.
Nes­ta stud­ied the dark ring on Elain’s fin­ger, the way she still seemed to
cra­dle it. A lady—that’s what Elain would become. What she was risk­ing
for this.
I met Nesta’s gaze. “There is no oth­er way.”
Her chin lift­ed slight­ly. “We’ll send the ser­vants away tomor­row.”
“Today,” I pushed. “We don’t have any time to lose. Order them to leave
now.”
“I’ll do it,” Elain said, tak­ing a deep breath and squar­ing her shoul­ders.
She didn’t wait for either of us before she strode out, grace­ful as a doe.
Alone with Nes­ta, I said, “Is he good—the lord’s son she’s to mar­ry?”
“She thinks he is. She loves him like he is.”
“And what do you think?”
Nesta’s eyes—my eyes, our mother’s eyes—met mine. “His father built a
wall of stone around their estate so high even the trees can’t reach over it. I
think it looks like a prison.”
“Have you said any­thing to her?”

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

W HEN I WALK INTO EVELYN’S office the next morn­ing, I’m so
ner­vous that my back is sweat­ing and a shal­low pool is form­ing along
my spine.
Grace puts down a char­cu­terie plat­ter, and I can’t stop star­ing at the
cor­ni­chons as Eve­lyn and Grace are talk­ing about Lis­bon in the
sum­mer.
The moment Grace is gone, I turn to Eve­lyn.
“We need to talk,” I say.
She laughs. “Hon­est­ly, I feel like that’s all we do.”
“About Vivant, I mean.”
“OK,” she says. “Talk.”
“I need to know some sort of time­line for when this book might be
released.” I wait for Eve­lyn to respond. I wait for her to give me
some­thing, any­thing, resem­bling an answer.
“I’m lis­ten­ing,” she says.
“If you don’t tell me when this book could real­is­ti­cal­ly be sold, then
I’m run­ning the risk of los­ing my job for some­thing that might be
years away. Decades, even.”
“You cer­tain­ly have high hopes for my life span.”
“Eve­lyn,” I say, some­what dis­cour­aged that she still isn’t tak­ing this
seri­ous­ly. “I either need to know when this is com­ing out or I need to
promise Vivant an excerpt of it for the June issue.”
Eve­lyn thinks. She is sit­ting cross-legged on the sofa oppo­site me,
in slim black jer­sey pants, a gray shell tank, and an over­sized white
cardi­gan. “OK,” she says, nod­ding. “You can give them a piece of it—
what­ev­er piece you like—for the June issue. If, and only if, you shut up
about this time­line busi­ness.”
I don’t let my joy show on my face. I’m halfway there. I can’t rest
until I’m done. I have to push her. I have to ask and be will­ing to be
told no. I have to know my worth.
After all, Eve­lyn wants some­thing from me. She needs me. I don’t
know why or what for, but I know I wouldn’t be sit­ting here if that
weren’t the case. I have val­ue to her. I know that. And now I have to
use it. Just as she would if she were me.
So here we go.
“You need to sit for a pho­to shoot. For the cov­er.”
“No.”
“It’s non­nego­tiable.”
“Every­thing is nego­tiable. Haven’t you got­ten enough? I’ve agreed
to the excerpt.”
“You and I both know how valu­able new images of you would be.”
“I said no.”
OK. Here we go. I can do this. I just have to do what Eve­lyn would
do. I have to “Eve­lyn Hugo” Eve­lyn Hugo. “You agree to the cov­er
pho­to, or I’m out.”
Eve­lyn sits for­ward in her chair. “Excuse me?”
“You want me to write your life sto­ry. I want to write your life sto­ry.
But these are my terms. I’m not going to lose my job for you. And the
way I keep my job is I deliv­er an Eve­lyn Hugo fea­ture with a cov­er. So
you either per­suade me to lose my job over this—which is only
pos­si­ble if you tell me when this book is being sold—or you do this.
Those are your options.”
Eve­lyn looks at me, and I get the impres­sion that I am more than
she bar­gained for. And I feel good about that. There’s a smile form­ing
that is hard to keep in.
“You’re hav­ing fun with this, aren’t you?” she says.
“I’m try­ing to pro­tect my inter­ests.”
“Yes, but you’re also good at it, and I think you’re delight­ing in it a
bit.”
I final­ly let the smile out. “I’m learn­ing from the best.”
“Yes, you are,” Eve­lyn says. She scrunch­es her nose. “A cov­er?”
“A cov­er.”

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

23
When I mar­ried Kevin, I meant it with all my heart. If you look into my eyes in
my wed­ding pho­tos, you can see it: I was so in love and so ready for a new phase
of my life to start. I want­ed babies with this man. I want­ed a cozy home. I
want­ed to grow old with him.
My lawyer told me that if I didn’t �le for divorce, Kevin would. What I
gath­ered from this was that Kevin want­ed to �le for divorce but he felt guilty
doing it. He knew that it would make him look bet­ter pub­licly if I was the one
who �led. My lawyer told me that Kevin was going to �le for divorce no mat­ter
what. I was led to believe that it would be bet­ter if I did it �rst so that I wasn’t
humil­i­at­ed.
I didn’t want to be embar­rassed, so in ear­ly Novem­ber 2006, when Jay­den
was almost two months old, I �led the papers. Kevin and I both asked for full
cus­tody of the boys. What I did not under­stand was that Kevin would then
insist I pay for his legal bills. And because legal­ly, I had set the divorce in motion,
I would be held respon­si­ble in the press for hav­ing bro­ken up my young fam­i­ly.
The media atten­tion was crazy. It was prob­a­bly good for Kevin’s album,
which came out a week before we announced our divorce, but I was vili�ed.
Some peo­ple tried to be supportive—but in the press, they often did this by
being cru­el toward Kevin, which actu­al­ly wasn’t that help­ful.
Lat­er that month, I pre­sent­ed at the Amer­i­can Music Awards. As I wait­ed to
go out onstage, Jim­my Kim­mel deliv­ered a mono­logue and skit about Kevin,
who he called “the world’s �rst-ever no-hit won­der.” They sealed a stand-in into
a crate and put it on a truck and dumped it into the ocean.
But this was the father of my two infant sons. I found the vio­lence toward
him unset­tling. The whole audi­ence was laugh­ing. I hadn’t known that was

You are being pro­vid­ed with a book chap­ter by chap­ter. I will request you to read the book for me after each chap­ter. After read­ing the chap­ter, 1. short­en the chap­ter to no less than 300 words and no more than 400 words. 2. Do not change the name, address, or any impor­tant nouns in the chap­ter. 3. Do not trans­late the orig­i­nal lan­guage. 4. Keep the same style as the orig­i­nal chap­ter, keep it con­sis­tent through­out the chap­ter. Your reply must com­ply with all four require­ments, or it’s invalid.
I will pro­vide the chap­ter now.

23
“Girl, I swear you’ve got­ten even skin­nier!”
Emi­ly is smil­ing as she says it to me, and I think it’s a com­pli­ment, but I can bare­ly make myself
smile back at her. We’re stand­ing in the open court­yard of the First Methodist Church, peo­ple milling
all around us, and I’m too aware of both how hot the evening is—even though the sun is going down
—and also how wrong my out­fit is.
In my defense, I had no idea what the fuck one was sup­posed to wear to a silent auc­tion at a
church on a Wednes­day night, and black had seemed a safe choice—sophisticated, respectable. But
all the oth­er women are in bright col­ors, flower prints, that kind of thing, and I feel like a crow
stand­ing around a bunch of flamin­gos.
Eddie must’ve known it was wrong, but he hadn’t said any­thing, and I fight the urge to glare at his
back as he stands there, talk­ing to the rev­erend.
Now I smooth my dress over my thighs and say, “Pre-wed­ding jit­ters,” to Emi­ly, who nods and
pats my arm sym­pa­thet­i­cal­ly.
“You’re lucky. When I got mar­ried to Saul, my stress response was to eat every­thing in sight.”
Her hus­band is over near a giant aza­lea bush, chat­ting with Campbell’s hus­band, Mark, and
Caroline’s hus­band, Matt.
I real­ize that I hard­ly ever see Eddie with those guys, and that he nev­er men­tions them. Did the
neigh­bor­hood pull back from him after every­thing with Bea and Blanche, or does he find these peo­ple
as insuf­fer­able as I do?
Okay, they’re not all bad. Emi­ly is actu­al­ly nice, steer­ing me around groups of peo­ple, intro­duc­ing
me as Eddie’s fiancée and nev­er once men­tion­ing the dog-walk­er thing.
It almost makes me feel sor­ry for all the shit I stole from her.
The auc­tion items are inside the church’s Fam­i­ly Life Cen­ter, but despite the heat, every­one is
con­gre­gat­ing out here in the court­yard, prob­a­bly because it’s so pret­ty and lush.
Maybe we should get mar­ried here instead of elop­ing after all.
But then think­ing about the wed­ding is too hard when Eddie is bare­ly speak­ing to me.
It’s been two nights since our fight in the bath­room, two nights of Eddie sleep­ing god knows
where in the house, of him leav­ing for work ear­ly and com­ing home late.
The worst part is that I’ve been relieved he’s been gone so much. It’s eas­i­er with him not there,
with­out look­ing at him every sec­ond, won­der­ing if that flash of hard­ness, cold­ness will come back.
The num­ber he gave me is still in my purse. I’ll nev­er call it, but I want it there as a reminder of
how bad­ly I almost fucked up, how lit­tle I even real­ly know about Eddie.
But here we are at the church’s lit­tle par­ty, min­gling in a gar­den, drink­ing lemon­ade because even
though the Methodists aren’t the Bap­tists, no one wants an open bar in front of Jesus, I guess, and I’m
just about to get anoth­er glass of the lemon­ade when Car­o­line approach­es us, her blond hair swing­ing
over her shoul­ders.
“Holy shit,” she breathes, sur­pris­ing me because I’ve nev­er heard her curse before and also,
Jesus. I’m going to hell for all kinds of things, but even I man­age to keep it PG at church.
She clutch­es my arm, her nails dig­ging in. “Tripp Ingra­ham has been arrest­ed.”
That last word is hissed in a whis­per, but it doesn’t mat­ter. I see oth­er peo­ple look­ing over at us,
and Emi­ly already has her phone out, frown­ing at the screen.
Eddie is still talk­ing to the rev­erend, and my insides feel frozen, my feet locked to the soft grass
beneath my too-tight heels.
“What?” I final­ly say, and she glances behind her at her hus­band.
“Matt just got a text from his friend in the DA’s office. Appar­ent­ly, they found some­thing when
they did the autop­sy? Or some­thing in the house? I don’t know, but I texted Ali­son who lives on his
street, and she said a cop car full-on showed up and took him away in hand­cuffs.”
Now Emi­ly is glanc­ing over at me, and I can see lit­tle groups start to form, prac­ti­cal­ly watch as
the gos­sip moves through the gath­er­ing, all thoughts of fundrais­ing replaced with this, the biggest sto­ry
to hit this neigh­bor­hood since Bea and Blanche died, I’d guess.
When I turn toward Eddie, he’s star­ing at me. And even across the court­yard I can see it in his
eyes.
He’s relieved.
The house is dark and qui­et as we walk in, both of us absorbed in our own thoughts.
When I tell Eddie I’m going to take a show­er, I wait for some of this old spark to come back, for a
sly grin and an offer to join me.
Instead, I get a dis­tract­ed nod as he keeps scrolling through his phone. He’d bare­ly spo­ken on the
car ride home, just con­firm­ing that yes, he’d heard the same thing, that they’d arrest­ed Tripp; yes, it
had some­thing to do with the night Bea and Blanche died; no, he didn’t know what the actu­al charges
were.
In the mas­ter bath­room, I step out of my dress, let­ting it pool there on the mar­ble floor, not
both­er­ing to hang it up. I prob­a­bly won’t wear it again any­way.
The water is scald­ing hot, which feels good after the weird chill I expe­ri­enced on the way home,
and I when I step back out of the show­er, the room is filled with steam.
Wrap­ping myself in a tow­el, I walk to the mir­ror, wip­ing the steam off with one hand.
My face stares back, plain and stark­ly pale, my hair wet and shoved back from my face.
You’re fine, I tell myself. You’re safe. It was Tripp the whole time because of course it was.
But that doesn’t real­ly make me feel bet­ter, and I’m frown­ing at my reflec­tion when Eddie steps
into the bath­room.
He shucks his clothes eas­i­ly, and I can’t help but watch him in the mir­ror. He’s so beau­ti­ful, so
per­fect­ly male, but I feel no surge of desire when I look at him, and he’s not meet­ing my eyes.
I take my robe from the hook near the door, wrap­ping it around me as he show­ers, and then I sit on
the lit­tle tuft­ed bench in front of the van­i­ty, comb­ing out my hair for much longer than I need to.
I’m wait­ing.
Final­ly, the water shuts off and Eddie steps out, wrap­ping a tow­el around his waist as I fum­ble in
a draw­er for the expen­sive mois­tur­iz­er I bought the oth­er day.
“The oth­er night. When we argued. Were you scared of me?”
I sit very still there at the bath­room counter, watch­ing him in the mir­ror. He’s got a tow­el around
his waist, water still dry­ing on his skin, his hair slicked back from his face, and there’s some­thing
about the way he’s look­ing at me that I don’t like.
“Did you think it was me? That I killed them?”
I blink, try­ing to recal­i­brate, try­ing to get this back on track. “The last few weeks have just been a
lot,” I final­ly say, adding a lit­tle tremor to my voice for effect. “Every­thing was final­ly so per­fect, and
we were so hap­py, and then…”
“And then you thought I mur­dered my wife and her best friend,” he says, relent­less, and my head
snaps up.
This isn’t how this is sup­posed to go. He’s sup­posed to feel sor­ry for snap­ping at me, for even
sug­gest­ing I thought such a thing.
But he’s still watch­ing me, arms fold­ed over his chest, and since the low­ered lash­es and
tremu­lous voice aren’t work­ing, I turn and meet his eyes.
“Yes,” I say, and hon­est­ly, it feels kind of good to tell the truth. “I did. Or I thought you may have
done it.”
He blows out a long breath, tilt­ing his head up to look at the ceil­ing before say­ing, “Well. At least
you’re hon­est.”
I step for­ward, curl­ing my hands around his wrists and pulling his arms down. “But I was wrong,”
I insist. “Obvi­ous­ly. And I’m sor­ry, Eddie. I’m so sor­ry.”
And the thing is, I am sor­ry. I’m sor­ry I ever thought he might have been involved with Bea’s and
Blanche’s death, and not just because I almost fucked up every­thing.
I’m the one lying to him, I’m the one who’s stolen from him, from every­one I’ve grown close to.
I’m the one who has pre­tend­ed to be some­thing she’s not.
I’m the one who has actu­al­ly done some­thing ter­ri­ble.
I press my fore­head to his damp chest, breath­ing in the scent of his soap. “I’m sor­ry,” I say again,
and after a long beat, I feel his hand rest gen­tly on the back of my head. “And you were right, the oth­er
night. I should’ve trust­ed you about John, I should’ve come to you—”
“It’s alright,” he mur­murs, but I’m afraid that it’s not. That I’ve let all my sus­pi­cions and dis­trust
ruin this per­fect thing I’ve found, this new life.
“Do you think it real­ly was Tripp?” I ask him, still stand­ing there in his arms, want­i­ng him to tell
me that yes, he does. That it’s that awful, but that sim­ple, and there’s an easy per­son to blame.
“I don’t want to think he could’ve done it,” he says. “How many times did I have that guy in my
house, or played golf with him, for fuck’s sake.” Anoth­er sigh, one I can feel as well as hear. “But he
and Blanche were hav­ing issues. God knows he drinks like a god­damn fish. If he was drunk and they
fought…”
He lets it trail off. I remem­ber now how uneasy Tripp has made me feel. I’d nev­er thought of it as
any­thing tru­ly threat­en­ing, but that didn’t mean it wasn’t. Who could ever real­ly know what some­one
was capa­ble of?
“The police are doing their job,” Eddie says, his hand still stroking the back of my head. “If they

Chap­ter 23 of “The Ten­ant of Wild­fell Hall” by Anne Bron­të nar­rates the pro­tag­o­nist’s reflec­tions on her ini­tial weeks of mat­ri­mo­ny, min­gling her cur­rent obser­va­tions with con­cerns and reck­on­ings about her hus­band, Arthur Hunt­ing­don. Mar­ried and set­tled at Grass­dale Manor, she admits that Arthur does not embody the ide­al she once believed him to be. Despite this, she finds her­self com­mit­ted to lov­ing him, dri­ven by both a sense of duty and affec­tion. Arthur’s fond­ness appears bound­less yet super­fi­cial, likened to a fire of twigs—bright but poten­tial­ly fleet­ing. She grap­ples with his self­ish­ness, par­tic­u­lar­ly evi­dent dur­ing their hon­ey­moon, which was rushed and cen­tered around Arthur’s expe­ri­ences and desires, neglect­ing her wish for deep­er immer­sion in the cul­tures they briefly encoun­tered.

Arthur’s predilec­tion for his own plea­sure over shared expe­ri­ences con­tin­ues to man­i­fest, notably in his pref­er­ence for quick grat­i­fi­ca­tion over shared spir­i­tu­al growth. Helen, on the oth­er hand, pri­or­i­tizes her devo­tion to God, assert­ing that her love for Arthur can­not super­sede her reli­gious com­mit­ments. This dynam­ic gen­er­ates ten­sion, with Arthur show­cas­ing a blend of jest and mild reproof towards Helen’s devout­ness, which he views as a chal­lenge to his place in her heart.

Their con­ver­sa­tions reveal foun­da­tion­al dif­fer­ences in their per­son­al­i­ties and val­ues. Arthur, seem­ing­ly light­heart­ed and focused on imme­di­ate grat­i­fi­ca­tion, con­trasts sharply with Helen’s depth of feel­ing and reflec­tive nature. Helen per­ceives these dif­fer­ences not just with res­ig­na­tion but sees them as areas for poten­tial growth, both for Arthur and with­in their mar­riage. She argues for a bal­ance where­in Arthur’s less­er reli­gious incli­na­tion would not deter him from being a good Chris­t­ian and a joy­ous, lov­ing hus­band.

Through these reflec­tions and dis­putes, Bron­të delves into themes of love, duty, and the com­plex­i­ties of mat­ri­mo­ny. Helen’s nar­ra­tive is both a can­did acknowl­edg­ment of her mar­i­tal dis­il­lu­sion­ment and a hope­ful, if some­what naïve, com­mit­ment to nur­tur­ing a pro­found and shared love, despite the emerg­ing chal­lenges and Arthur’s evi­dent flaws.