In Chap­ter 34 of “The Art Thief,” the nar­ra­tive cen­ters around the legal con­se­quences faced by Bre­itwieser after his exten­sive art thefts. The chap­ter opens with the legal process cul­mi­nat­ing in a deci­sion made in just two and a half hours. The law pri­or­i­tizes the method of theft over the item stolen, cat­e­go­riz­ing Breitwieser’s actions as sim­ple theft since no vio­lence was involved. He’s sen­tenced to four years in prison, with addi­tion­al fines amount­ing to hun­dreds of thou­sands of dol­lars owed to muse­ums, which he per­ceives as unfair giv­en his ear­li­er expec­ta­tions of lenien­cy for coop­er­at­ing with the police.

As Bre­itwieser serves his time in a Swiss deten­tion cen­ter, he works dur­ing the day dis­man­tling com­put­ers and earns a min­i­mal wage, all of which goes toward pay­ing his fines. Vis­its from his father bring some com­fort, yet the medi­a’s exag­ger­at­ed por­tray­al of his stolen art gives him a mixed sense of pride. Despite endur­ing two Christ­mases and his thir­ty-sec­ond birth­day in prison, he dis­cov­ers a new inter­est in ping-pong, although he strug­gles with per­son­al hygiene due to embar­rass­ment.

When he is final­ly trans­port­ed back to France—coupled with dis­tress­ing news about his moth­er’s job loss and their home sale—he finds him­self in a crowd­ed prison cell in Stras­bourg, where liv­ing con­di­tions stark­ly con­trast those in Switzer­land. After weeks of con­fine­ment, Bre­itwieser meets with French inves­ti­ga­tor Michèle Lis-Schaal and is con­front­ed with incon­sis­ten­cies between his and Anne-Catherine’s tes­ti­monies. A brief encounter with Anne-Cather­ine stirs emo­tions, com­pound­ed by her silence and report of being pro­hib­it­ed from con­tact­ing him.

In a sur­pris­ing twist, dur­ing her tes­ti­mo­ny, Anne-Cather­ine reveals she is the moth­er of a nine­teen-month-old child, lead­ing Bre­itwieser to feel both dev­as­tat­ed and immo­bi­lized by the rev­e­la­tion that she had become preg­nant by anoth­er man after his arrest. This chap­ter encap­su­lates Breitwieser’s tur­moil, loss, and the com­plex inter­play of his rela­tion­ships amidst the reper­cus­sions of his actions .

In Chap­ter 34 of “We Solve Mur­ders,” Eddie Flood steps off a plane into the humid air of South Car­oli­na, sport­ing sun­glass­es and a con­cealed agen­da. Hired to kill a woman for thir­ty thou­sand pounds, Eddie is aware that there’s more to his mis­sion, though he can’t share the details with Rob Ken­na, who would be enraged if he knew. His suit­case con­tains var­i­ous dis­guis­es: tourist clothes, busi­ness attire, and com­bat fatigues, along with his ever-present lap­top, which he’s used to research bul­let wounds dur­ing the flight.

Nav­i­gat­ing through the ter­mi­nal, Eddie encoun­ters two cus­toms officers—one a thin white man with a mus­tache and the oth­er a robust black man named Car­los Moss, whom Eddie approach­es con­fi­dent­ly. As Eddie hands over his pass­port, they engage in small talk about Eddie’s vis­it, with Eddie false­ly claim­ing to be a fan of local author Rosie D’Antonio. He attempts to gath­er infor­ma­tion casu­al­ly, express­ing inter­est in Rosie’s lifestyle and ques­tion­ing Car­los about her.

Car­los remains pro­fes­sion­al and guard­ed, push­ing back against Eddie’s ques­tions. Eddie’s charm doesn’t dis­suade Car­los, who sees through the façade and informs Eddie that he needs to con­duct a ran­dom check. Eddie per­ceives this as an oppor­tu­ni­ty, hop­ing for a pri­vate con­ver­sa­tion where he can offer Car­los mon­ey in exchange for infor­ma­tion.

As Car­los leads Eddie into what resem­bles an inter­ro­ga­tion room, Eddie attempts to estab­lish rap­port by dis­cussing music, claim­ing to be a hip-hop fan, even though he prefers Van Halen. After instruct­ing Eddie to sit while he steps out to pre­sum­ably inform oth­ers of Eddie’s pres­ence, he locks the door behind him, mark­ing a famil­iar sit­u­a­tion for Eddie.

Now left alone, Eddie con­sid­ers the sit­u­a­tion. He knows he can offer Car­los up to a thou­sand dol­lars for infor­ma­tion and plans to start with three hun­dred. With time on his hands, he pulls out his lap­top, prepar­ing to han­dle his busi­ness while wait­ing for Car­los. This chap­ter effec­tive­ly encap­su­lates Eddie’s ten­sion, deceit, and the strate­gic maneu­ver­ing required in his dan­ger­ous line of work, illus­trat­ing his relent­less quest for infor­ma­tion.

In a dim­ly lit room sep­a­rat­ed by heavy drapes, Saint is instruct­ed to sit on a wood­en crate while the pho­tog­ra­ph­er, Mr. Aaron, pre­pares the light­ing. As he adjusts the set­up, his mur­mured words draw Sain­t’s atten­tion, and she rec­og­nizes a haunt­ing scrip­ture from her child­hood, “He leads me beside qui­et waters,” which her grand­moth­er used to recite—a funer­al prayer that chills her. Just as she con­tem­plates speak­ing up, the gen­er­a­tor ceas­es, plung­ing them into dark­ness.

In flash­es of light from his cam­era, she glimpses Mr. Aaron, who instructs her to remove her glass­es. Hes­i­tant­ly, she com­plies, feel­ing vul­ner­a­ble as he urges her not to smile, claim­ing it con­ceals her true self. As he cap­tures her image, the con­ver­sa­tion turns unset­tling; Saint con­nects the pho­tog­ra­ph­er to a series of miss­ing girls, includ­ing a high school stu­dent and a col­lege girl.

Mr. Aaron reveals his igno­rance about her iden­ti­ty, spark­ing a poignant exchange where she shares her name. His delight­ed reac­tion brings a stir of emo­tion. Curi­ous about her spir­i­tu­al life, he asks if she prays, prompt­ing her earnest affir­ma­tion. When he inquires what she requests in prayer, her answer, “A fit and just end,” res­onates with fore­bod­ing.

Laugh­ter escapes him, echo­ing a bib­li­cal ref­er­ence, to which she responds in kind, assert­ing her knowl­edge of scrip­ture. Their dia­logue dips into the morose as he men­tions “fiery ser­pents” and express­es a strange admi­ra­tion for her beau­ty, leav­ing her with a sense of dread. She recalls chill­ing details from a news­pa­per arti­cle about the dis­ap­pear­ances, specif­i­cal­ly men­tion­ing a blue van asso­ci­at­ed with the abduc­tions.

In a pro­found­ly unset­tling moment, Mr. Aaron reveals he pos­sess­es a blue van. When Saint hes­i­tant­ly ques­tions him about the miss­ing girls, he chill­ing­ly con­fess­es, “Yes.” The atmos­phere thick­ens with ten­sion, and a sense of hor­ror fills the space.

Wait­ing ai

Chap­ter Thir­ty-Four opens with the nar­ra­tor wak­ing up beside Andrew in the guest bed­room, a deci­sion made as a com­pro­mise to avoid sleep­ing in the mas­ter bed­room still taint­ed with Nina’s pres­ence. The inti­ma­cy of their morn­ing under­scored by Andrew’s affec­tions and their shared dis­dain for Nina sets the tone for a blos­som­ing rela­tion­ship. Andrew express­es his desire to give their rela­tion­ship a gen­uine chance, insist­ing the nar­ra­tor is no longer to play the role of a maid but to con­sid­er the pos­si­bil­i­ty of a future togeth­er. The nar­ra­tor’s unease at this pro­pos­al is briefly touched on, as is her crim­i­nal record, which she fears might com­pli­cate her abil­i­ty to find employ­ment.

The day takes a turn when the nar­ra­tor receives a call from a blocked num­ber, imme­di­ate­ly sus­pect­ed to be Nina, stir­ring a mix of antic­i­pa­tion and dread. This moment of peace is quick­ly dis­rupt­ed, not only by the mys­te­ri­ous caller but also by Andrew’s sud­den deter­mi­na­tion to con­front Enzo, the land­scap­er who seems pecu­liar­ly omnipresent in their yard.

Andrew’s inter­ac­tion with Enzo is marked by a sub­tle pow­er strug­gle, resolved quick­ly by Enzo’s indif­fer­ent accep­tance of his dis­missal. But the chap­ter takes a sig­nif­i­cant and omi­nous twist when Enzo, upon Andrew’s depar­ture, grabs the nar­ra­tor’s arm to warn her of the dan­ger she is in, a moment that shifts the nar­ra­tive from domes­tic tran­quil­i­ty to a fore­bod­ing sense of threat.

This chap­ter deft­ly encap­su­lates the com­plex inter­play of new begin­nings and unre­solved pasts, the search for iden­ti­ty and pur­pose against the back­drop of inter­per­son­al dynam­ics, and the ever-present under­cur­rents of fore­bod­ing that hint at dark­er ele­ments at play. The jux­ta­po­si­tion of domes­tic­i­ty with under­ly­ing ten­sion and sus­pense sets a tone of unease, effec­tive­ly mov­ing the nar­ra­tive for­ward while keep­ing the read­er engaged in the unfold­ing dra­ma and the nar­ra­tor’s uncer­tain future.

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
34
Mer­ci­ful­ly, there was no sound from his closed bed­room. And no sounds
came out of it dur­ing that night, when I jolt­ed awake from a night­mare of
being turned over a spit, and couldn’t remem­ber where I was.
Moon­light danced on the sea beyond my open win­dows, and there was
silence—such silence.
A weapon. I was a weapon to find that book, to stop the king from
break­ing the wall, to stop what­ev­er he had planned for Juri­an and the war
that might destroy my world. That might destroy this place—and a High
Lord who might very well over­turn the order of things.
For a heart­beat, I missed Velaris, missed the lights and the music and the
Rain­bow. I missed the cozy warmth of the town house to wel­come me in
from the crisp win­ter, missed … what it had been like to be a part of their
lit­tle unit.
Maybe wrap­ping his wings around me, writ­ing me notes, had been
Rhys’s way of ensur­ing his weapon didn’t break beyond repair.
That was fine—fair enough. We owed each oth­er noth­ing beyond our
promis­es to work and fight togeth­er.
He could still be my friend. Companion—whatever this thing was
between us. His tak­ing some­one to his bed didn’t change those things.
It’d just been a relief to think that for a moment, he might have been as
lone­ly as me.
I didn’t have the nerve to come out of my room for break­fast, to see if Rhys
had returned.
To see whom he came to break­fast with.
I had noth­ing else to do, I told myself as I lay in bed, until my lunchtime
vis­it with Tar­quin. So I stayed there until the ser­vants came in, apol­o­gized
for dis­turb­ing me, and start­ed to leave. I stopped them, say­ing I’d bathe
while they cleaned the room. They were polite—if nervous—and mere­ly
nod­ded as I did as I’d claimed.
I took my time in the bath. And behind the locked door, I let that ker­nel
of Tarquin’s pow­er come out, first mak­ing the water rise from the tub, then
shap­ing lit­tle ani­mals and crea­tures out of it.
It was about as close to trans­for­ma­tion as I’d let myself go.
Con­tem­plat­ing how I might give myself ani­mal­is­tic fea­tures only made me
shaky, sick. I could ignore it, ignore that occa­sion­al scrape of claws in my
blood for a while yet.
I was on to water-but­ter­flies flit­ting through the room when I real­ized I’d
been in the tub long enough that the bath had gone cold.
Like the night before, Nuala walked through the walls from wher­ev­er she
was stay­ing in the palace, and dressed me, some­how attuned to when I’d be
ready. Cer­rid­wen, she told me, had drawn the short stick and was see­ing to
Amren. I didn’t have the nerve to ask about Rhys, either.
Nuala select­ed seafoam green accent­ed with rose gold, curl­ing and then
braid­ing back my hair in a thick, loose plait glim­mer­ing with bits of pearl.
Whether Nuala knew why I was there, what I’d be doing, she didn’t say.
But she took extra care of my face, bright­en­ing my lips with rasp­ber­ry pink,
dust­ing my cheeks with the faintest blush. I might have looked inno­cent,
charming—were it not for my gray-blue eyes. More hol­low than they’d
been last night, when I’d admired myself in the mir­ror.
I’d seen enough of the palace to nav­i­gate to where Tar­quin had said to
meet before we bid good night. The main hall was sit­u­at­ed on a lev­el about
halfway up—the per­fect meet­ing place for those who dwelled in the spires
above and those who worked unseen and unheard below.
This lev­el held all the var­i­ous coun­cil rooms, ball­rooms, din­ing rooms,
and what­ev­er oth­er rooms might be need­ed for vis­i­tors, events, gath­er­ings.
Access to the res­i­den­tial lev­els from which I’d come was guard­ed by four
sol­diers at each stairwell—all of whom watched me care­ful­ly as I wait­ed
against a seashell pil­lar for their High Lord. I won­dered if he could sense
that I’d been play­ing with his pow­er in the bath­tub, that the piece of him
he’d yield­ed was now here and answer­ing to me.
Tar­quin emerged from one of the adja­cent rooms as the clock struck two
—fol­lowed by my own com­pan­ions.
Rhysand’s gaze swept over me, not­ing the clothes that were obvi­ous­ly in
hon­or of my host and his peo­ple. Not­ing the way I did not meet his eyes, or
Cresseida’s, as I looked sole­ly at Tar­quin and Amren beside him—Varian
now strid­ing off to the sol­diers at the stairs—and gave them both a bland,
close-lipped smile.
“You’re look­ing well today,” Tar­quin said, inclin­ing his head.
Nuala, it seemed, was a spec­tac­u­lar­ly good spy. Tarquin’s pewter tunic
was accent­ed with the same shade of seafoam green as my clothes. We
might as well have been a match­ing set. I sup­posed with my brown-gold
hair and pale skin, I was his mir­ror oppo­site.
I could feel Rhys still assess­ing me.
I shut him out. Maybe I’d send a water-dog bark­ing after him later—let it
bite him in the ass.
“I hope I’m not inter­rupt­ing,” I said to Amren.
Amren shrugged her slim shoul­ders, clad in flag­stone gray today. “We
were fin­ish­ing up a rather live­ly debate about armadas and who might be in
charge of a uni­fied front. Did you know,” she said, “that before they became
so big and pow­er­ful, Tar­quin and Var­i­an led Nostrus’s fleet?”
Var­i­an, sev­er­al feet away, stiff­ened, but did not turn.
I met Tarquin’s eye. “You didn’t men­tion you were a sailor.” It was an
effort to sound intrigued, like I had noth­ing at all both­er­ing me.
Tar­quin rubbed his neck. “I had planned to tell you dur­ing our tour.” He
held out an arm. “Shall we?”
Not one word—I had not uttered one word to Rhysand. And I wasn’t
about to start as I looped my arm through Tarquin’s, and said to none of
them in par­tic­u­lar, “See you lat­er.”
Some­thing brushed against my men­tal shield, a rum­ble of some­thing dark
—pow­er­ful.
Per­haps a warn­ing to be care­ful.
Though it felt an awful lot like the dark, flick­er­ing emo­tion that had
haunt­ed me—so much like it that I stepped a bit clos­er to Tar­quin. And then
I gave the High Lord of Sum­mer a pret­ty, mind­less smile that I had not
giv­en to any­one in a long, long time.
That brush of emo­tion went silent on the oth­er side of my shields.
Good.
Tar­quin brought me to a hall of jew­els and trea­sure so vast that I gawked for
a good minute. A minute that I used to scan the shelves for any twin­kle of
feeling—anything that felt like the male at my side, like the pow­er I’d
sum­moned in the bath­tub.
“And this is—this is just one of the troves?” The room had been carved
deep beneath the cas­tle, behind a heavy lead door that had only opened
when Tar­quin placed his hand on it. I didn’t dare get close enough to the
lock to see if it might work under my touch—his feigned sig­na­ture.
A fox in the chick­en coop. That’s what I was.
Tar­quin loosed a chuck­le. “My ances­tors were greedy bas­tards.”
I shook my head, strid­ing to the shelves built into the wall. Sol­id stone—
no way to break in, unless I tun­neled through the moun­tain itself. Or if
some­one win­nowed me. Though there were like­ly wards sim­i­lar to those on
the town house and the House of Wind.
Box­es over­flowed with jew­els and pearls and uncut gems, gold heaped in
trunks so high it spilled onto the cob­ble­stone floor. Suits of ornate armor
stood guard against one wall; dress­es woven of cob­webs and starlight
leaned against anoth­er. There were swords and dag­gers of every sort. But
no books. Not one.
“Do you know the his­to­ry behind each piece?”
“Some,” he said. “I haven’t had much time to learn about it all.”
Good—maybe he wouldn’t know about the Book, wouldn’t miss it.
I turned in a cir­cle. “What’s the most valu­able thing in here?”
“Think­ing of steal­ing?”
I choked on a laugh. “Wouldn’t ask­ing that ques­tion make me a lousy
thief?”
Lying, two-faced wretch—that’s what ask­ing that ques­tion made me.
Tar­quin stud­ied me. “I’d say I’m look­ing at the most valu­able thing in
here.”
I didn’t fake the blush. “You’re—very kind.”
His smile was soft. As if his posi­tion had not yet bro­ken the com­pas­sion
in him. I hoped it nev­er did. “Hon­est­ly, I don’t know what’s the most
valu­able thing. These are all price­less heir­looms of my house.”
I walked up to a shelf, scan­ning. A neck­lace of rubies was splayed on a
vel­vet pillow—each of them the size of a robin’s egg. It’d take a
tremen­dous female to wear that neck­lace, to dom­i­nate the gems and not the
oth­er way around.
On anoth­er shelf, a neck­lace of pearls. Then sap­phires.
And on anoth­er … a neck­lace of black dia­monds.
Each of the dark stones was a mystery—and an answer. Each of them
slum­bered.
Tar­quin came up behind me, peer­ing over my shoul­der at what had
snagged my inter­est. His gaze drift­ed to my face. “Take it.”
“What?” I whirled to him.
He rubbed the back of his neck. “As a thank-you. For Under the
Moun­tain.”
Ask it now—ask him for the Book instead.
But that would require trust, and … kind as he was, he was a High Lord.
He pulled the box from its rest­ing spot and shut the lid before hand­ing it
to me. “You were the first per­son who didn’t laugh at my idea to break
down class bar­ri­ers. Even Cres­sei­da snick­ered when I told her. If you won’t
accept the neck­lace for sav­ing us, then take it for that.”
“It is a good idea, Tar­quin. Appre­ci­at­ing it doesn’t mean you have to
reward me.”
He shook his head. “Just take it.”
It would insult him if I refused—so I closed my hands around the box.
Tar­quin said, “It will suit you in the Night Court.”
“Per­haps I’ll stay here and help you rev­o­lu­tion­ize the world.”
His mouth twist­ed to the side. “I could use an ally in the North.”
Was that why he had brought me? Why he’d giv­en me the gift? I hadn’t
real­ized how alone we were down here, that I was beneath ground, in a
place that could be eas­i­ly sealed—
“You have noth­ing to fear from me,” he said, and I won­dered if my scent
was that read­able. “But I meant it—you have … sway with Rhysand. And
he is noto­ri­ous­ly dif­fi­cult to deal with. He gets what he wants, has plans he
does not tell any­one about until after he’s com­plet­ed them, and does not
apol­o­gize for any of it. Be his emis­sary to the human realm—but also be
ours. You’ve seen my city. I have three oth­ers like it. Ama­ran­tha wrecked
them almost imme­di­ate­ly after she took over. All my peo­ple want now is
peace, and safe­ty, and to nev­er have to look over their shoul­ders again.
Oth­er High Lords have told me about Rhys—and warned me about him.
But he spared me Under the Moun­tain. Bru­tius was my cousin, and we had
forces gath­er­ing in all of our cities to storm Under the Moun­tain. They
caught him sneak­ing out through the tun­nels to meet with them. Rhys saw
that in Brutius’s mind—I know he did. And yet he lied to her face, and
defied her when she gave the order to turn him into a liv­ing ghost. Maybe it
was for his own schemes, but I know it was a mer­cy. He knows that I am
young—and inex­pe­ri­enced, and he spared me.” Tar­quin shook his head,
most­ly at him­self. “Some­times, I think Rhysand … I think he might have
been her whore to spare us all from her full atten­tion.”
I would betray noth­ing of what I knew. But I sus­pect­ed he could see it in
my eyes—the sor­row at the thought.
“I know I’m sup­posed to look at you,” Tar­quin said, “and see that he’s
made you into a pet, into a mon­ster. But I see the kind­ness in you. And I
think that reflects more on him than any­thing. I think it shows that you and
he might have many secrets—”
“Stop,” I blurt­ed. “Just—stop. You know I can’t tell you any­thing. And I
can’t promise you any­thing. Rhysand is High Lord. I only serve in his
court.”
Tar­quin glanced at the ground. “For­give me if I’ve been for­ward. I’m still
learn­ing how to play the games of these courts—to my advis­ers’ cha­grin.”
“I hope you nev­er learn how to play the games of these courts.”
Tar­quin held my gaze, face wary, but a bit bleak. “Then allow me to ask
you a blunt ques­tion. Is it true you left Tam­lin because he locked you up in
his house?”
I tried to block out the mem­o­ry, the ter­ror and agony of my heart
break­ing apart. But I nod­ded.
“And is it true that you were saved from con­fine­ment by the Night
Court?”
I nod­ded again.
Tar­quin said, “The Spring Court is my south­ern neigh­bor. I have ten­u­ous
ties with them. But unless asked, I will not men­tion that you were here.”
Thief, liar, manip­u­la­tor. I didn’t deserve his alliance.
But I bowed my head in thanks. “Any oth­er trea­sure troves to show me?”
“Are gold and jew­els not impres­sive enough? What of your merchant’s
eye?”
I tapped the box. “Oh, I got what I want­ed. Now I’m curi­ous to see how
much your alliance is worth.”
Tar­quin laughed, the sound bounc­ing off the stone and wealth around us.
“I didn’t feel like going to my meet­ings this after­noon, any­way.”
“What a reck­less, wild young High Lord.”
Tar­quin linked elbows with me again, pat­ting my arm as he led me from
the cham­ber. “You know, I think it might be very easy to love you, too,
Feyre. Eas­i­er to be your friend.”
I made myself look away shy­ly as he sealed the door shut behind us,
plac­ing a palm flat on the space above the han­dle. I lis­tened to the click of
locks slid­ing into place.
He took me to oth­er rooms beneath his palace, some full of jew­els, oth­ers
weapons, oth­ers clothes from eras long since past. He showed me one full
of books, and my heart leaped—but there was noth­ing in there. Noth­ing but
leather and dust and qui­et. No trick­le of pow­er that felt like the male beside
me—no hint of the book I need­ed.
Tar­quin brought me to one last room, full of crates and stacks cov­ered in
sheets. And as I beheld all the art­work loom­ing beyond the open door I
said, “I think I’ve seen enough for today.”
He asked no ques­tions as he resealed the cham­ber and escort­ed me back
to the busy, sun­ny upper lev­els.
There had to be oth­er places where it might be stored. Unless it was in
anoth­er city.
I had to find it. Soon. There was only so long Rhys and Amren could
draw out their polit­i­cal debates before we had to go home. I just prayed I’d
find it fast enough—and not hate myself any more than I cur­rent­ly did.
Rhysand was loung­ing on my bed as if he owned it.
I took one look at the hands crossed behind his head, the long legs draped
over the edge of the mat­tress, and ground my teeth. “What do you want?” I
shut the door loud enough to empha­size the bite in my words.
“Flirt­ing and gig­gling with Tar­quin did you no good, I take it?”
I chucked the box onto the bed beside him. “You tell me.”
The smile fal­tered as he sat up, flip­ping open the lid. “This isn’t the
Book.”
“No, but it’s a beau­ti­ful gift.”
“You want me to buy you jew­el­ry, Feyre, then say the word. Though
giv­en your wardrobe, I thought you were aware that it was all bought for
you.”
I hadn’t real­ized, but I said, “Tar­quin is a good male—a good High Lord.
You should just ask him for the damned Book.”
Rhys snapped shut the lid. “So he plies you with jew­els and pours hon­ey
in your ear, and now you feel bad?”
“He wants your alliance—desperately. He wants to trust you, rely on
you.”
“Well, Cres­sei­da is under the impres­sion that her cousin is rather
ambi­tious, so I’d be care­ful to read between his words.”
“Oh? Did she tell you that before, dur­ing, or after you took her to bed?”
Rhys stood in a grace­ful, slow move­ment. “Is that why you wouldn’t
look at me? Because you think I fucked her for infor­ma­tion?”
“Infor­ma­tion or your own plea­sure, I don’t care.”
He came around the bed, and I stood my ground, even as he stopped with
hard­ly a hand’s breadth between us. “Jeal­ous, Feyre?”
“If I’m jeal­ous, then you’re jeal­ous about Tar­quin and his hon­ey
pour­ing.”
Rhysand’s teeth flashed. “Do you think I par­tic­u­lar­ly like hav­ing to flirt
with a lone­ly female to get infor­ma­tion about her court, her High Lord? Do
you think I feel good about myself, doing that? Do you think I enjoy doing
it just so you have the space to ply Tar­quin with your smiles and pret­ty
eyes, so we can get the Book and go home?”
“You seemed to enjoy your­self plen­ty last night.”
His snarl was soft—vicious. “I didn’t take her to bed. She want­ed to, but
I didn’t so much as kiss her. I took her out for a drink in the city, let her talk
about her life, her pres­sures, and brought her back to her room, and went no
far­ther than the door. I wait­ed for you at break­fast, but you slept in. Or
avoid­ed me, appar­ent­ly. And I tried to catch your eye this after­noon, but
you were so good at shut­ting me out com­plete­ly.”
“Is that what got under your skin? That I shut you out, or that it was so
easy for Tar­quin to get in?”
“What got under my skin,” Rhys said, his breath­ing a bit uneven, “is that
you smiled at him.”
The rest of the world fad­ed to mist as the words sank in. “You are
jeal­ous.”
He shook his head, stalk­ing to the lit­tle table against the far wall and
knock­ing back a glass of amber liq­uid. He braced his hands on the table, the
pow­er­ful mus­cles of his back quiv­er­ing beneath his shirt as the shad­ow of
those wings strug­gled to take form.
“I heard what you told him,” he said. “That you thought it would be easy
to fall in love with him. You meant it, too.”
“So?” It was the only thing I could think of to say.
“I was jealous—of that. That I’m not … that sort of per­son. For any­one.
The Sum­mer Court has always been neu­tral; they only showed back­bone
dur­ing those years Under the Moun­tain. I spared Tarquin’s life because I’d
heard how he want­ed to even out the play­ing field between High Fae and
less­er faeries. I’ve been try­ing to do that for years. Unsuc­cess­ful­ly, but … I
spared him for that alone. And Tar­quin, with his neu­tral court … he will
nev­er have to wor­ry about some­one walk­ing away because the threat
against their life, their children’s lives, will always be there. So, yes, I was
jeal­ous of him—because it will always be easy for him. And he will nev­er
know what it is to look up at the night sky and wish.”
The Court of Dreams.
The peo­ple who knew that there was a price, and one worth pay­ing, for
that dream. The bas­tard-born war­riors, the Illyr­i­an half-breed, the mon­ster
trapped in a beau­ti­ful body, the dream­er born into a court of night­mares …
And the huntress with an artist’s soul.
And per­haps because it was the most vul­ner­a­ble thing he’d said to me,
per­haps it was the burn­ing in my eyes, but I walked to where he stood over
the lit­tle bar. I didn’t look at him as I took the decanter of amber liq­uid and
poured myself a knuckle’s length, then refilled his.

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.

I PUT ON A RISQUÉ dress that showed just a lit­tle too much cleav­age,
and I drove up Hill­crest Road with Har­ry.
He pulled over to the side, and I moved toward him. I’d stuck with
nude lip­stick, because I knew red would be push­ing it. I was care­ful to
con­trol the ele­ments enough but not too much, because I didn’t want it
to look per­fect. I want­ed to be sure the pho­to wouldn’t look staged. I
needn’t have been wor­ried. Pic­tures speak very loud­ly. In gen­er­al, we
can almost nev­er shake what we see with our eyes.
“So how do you want to do this?” Har­ry said.
“Are you ner­vous?” I asked him. “Have you kissed a woman
before?”
Har­ry looked at me as if I was an idiot. “Of course I have.”
“Have you ever made love to one?”
“Once.”
“Did you like it?”
Har­ry thought. “That one’s hard­er to answer.”
“Pre­tend I’m a man, then,” I said. “Pre­tend you have to have me.”
“I can kiss you unprompt­ed, Eve­lyn. I don’t need you to direct me.”
“We have to be doing it long enough that when they come by, it
looks like we’ve been here for a while.”
Har­ry messed up his hair and pulled at his col­lar. I laughed and
messed mine up, too. I pushed one shoul­der off my dress.
“Ooh,” Har­ry said. “It’s get­ting very racy in here.”
I pushed him away, laugh­ing. We heard a car com­ing up behind us,
the head­lights shin­ing ahead.
Pan­icked, Har­ry grabbed me by both arms and kissed me. He
pressed his lips hard against mine, and just as the car passed us, he
ran one hand through my hair.
“I think it was just a neigh­bor,” I said, watch­ing the car’s rear lights
as it made its way far­ther up the canyon.
Har­ry grabbed my hand. “We could do it, you know.”
“What?”
“We could get mar­ried. I mean, as long as we’re gonna pre­tend to
do it, we could real­ly do it. It’s not so crazy. After all, I love you. Maybe
not the way a hus­band is sup­posed to love a wife but enough, I think.”
“Har­ry.”
“And . .  . what I told you yes­ter­day about want­i­ng a wife. I’ve been
think­ing, and if this works, if peo­ple buy it . . . maybe we could raise a
fam­i­ly togeth­er. Don’t you want to have a fam­i­ly?”
“Yes,” I said. “Even­tu­al­ly, I think I do.”
“We could be great for each oth­er. And we won’t just give up when
the bloom falls off the rose, because we already know each oth­er
bet­ter than that.”
“Har­ry, I can’t tell if you’re seri­ous.”
“I’m dead seri­ous. At least, I think I am.”
“You want to mar­ry me?”
“I want to be with some­one I love. I want to have a com­pan­ion. I’d
like to bring some­one home to my fam­i­ly. I don’t want to live alone
any­more. And I want a son or a daugh­ter. We could have that togeth­er.
I can’t give you every­thing. I know that. But I want to raise a fam­i­ly,
and I’d love to raise one with you.”
“Har­ry, I’m cyn­i­cal and I’m bossy, and most peo­ple would con­sid­er
me vague­ly immoral.”
“You’re strong and resilient and tal­ent­ed. You’re excep­tion­al inside
and out.”
He had real­ly thought about this.
“And you? And your . . . pro­cliv­i­ties? How does that work?”
“The same as it has with you and Rex. I do what I do. Dis­creet­ly, of
course. You do what you do.”
“But I don’t want to con­tin­ue to have affairs my entire life. I want to
be with some­one I’m in love with. Some­one who’s in love with me.”
“Well, that I can’t help you with,” Har­ry said. “For that one, you
have to call her.”
I looked down at my lap, stared at my fin­ger­nails.

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.

34
While over­all I was mis­er­able, day-to-day I was able to �nd joy and com­fort in
the boys and in my rou­tine. I made friends. I dat­ed Jason Traw­ick. He was ten
years old­er than me and real­ly had his life togeth­er. I loved that he wasn’t a
per­former but was an agent, so he knew the busi­ness and under­stood my life. We
end­ed up dat­ing for three years.
When we went out togeth­er, he was hyper­vig­i­lant. I knew I could be clue­less
some­times. (I’m not clue­less any­more. Now I’m basi­cal­ly a CIA agent.) He was
always scop­ing every­thing out, obses­sive­ly con­trol­ling sit­u­a­tions. I’d been
around the paparazzi so much that I knew what was up; I knew the deal. So to
see him in a suit, work­ing at this huge agency, get­ting in the car with me, I felt he
was almost too aware of who I was. He cared too much about man­ag­ing things.
I was used to pho­tog­ra­phers swarm­ing me on the streets and I hard­ly noticed
them any­more, which I sup­pose isn’t real­ly good, either.
We did have a great rela­tion­ship. I felt a lot of love for him and from him.
I was still messed up psy­cho­log­i­cal­ly from every­thing that had hap­pened with
Kevin and my kids, and from liv­ing under the stric­tures of the con­ser­va­tor­ship
my father had set up. I had a place in Thou­sand Oaks, Cal­i­for­nia. My kids were
young at the time and my father was still in charge of my life.
Even though I was on a break after the Femme Fatale Tour, my father sec­ond-
guessed every lit­tle thing I did, includ­ing what I ate. It puz­zled me that my mom
nev­er said any­thing about it—my par­ents got back togeth­er in 2010, eight years
after their divorce. And I felt so betrayed by the state of Cal­i­for­nia. My mom
seemed to love that because of the con­ser­va­tor­ship, my dad now had a real job.
They watched Crim­i­nal Minds on the couch every fuck­ing night. Who does
that?
When my father told me I couldn’t have dessert, I felt that it was not just him
telling me but my fam­i­ly and my state, like I was not allowed legal­ly to eat
dessert, because he said no.
Even­tu­al­ly, I start­ed to ask myself, Wait, where am I? Noth­ing real­ly made
sense any­more.
Feel­ing like I need­ed more direc­tion, I decid­ed to go back to work. I tried to
occu­py myself by being pro­duc­tive. I began appear­ing on more TV shows—
includ­ing, in 2012, as a judge on The X Fac­tor.
I think a lot of peo­ple are real­ly pro­fes­sion­al on TV, like Christi­na Aguil­era
and Gwen Ste­fani. When the cam­era is on them, they thrive. And that’s great. I
used to be able to do that when I was younger, but again, I feel like I age
back­ward when I’m afraid. And so I got to where I was very, very ner­vous if I
knew I had to be on air, and I didn’t like being ner­vous all day long. Maybe I’m
just not cut out for that any­more.
I’ve accept­ed that now, and it’s okay. I can tell peo­ple who try to push me in
that direc­tion no. I’ve been forced into things I didn’t want to do and been
humil­i­at­ed. It’s not my thing at this point. Now, if you got me a cute cameo on a
fun TV show where I’m in and out in a day, that’s one thing, but to act skep­ti­cal
for eight hours straight while judg­ing peo­ple on TV? Uh, no thank you. I
absolute­ly hat­ed it.
It was around that time that I got engaged to Jason. He got me through a lot
of things. But in 2012, not long after he became my co-con­ser­va­tor, my feel­ings
changed. I couldn’t see it then, but I see now that hav­ing him tied up with the
orga­ni­za­tion con­trol­ling my life might have played a part in drain­ing the
romance out of our rela­tion­ship. There came a point when I real­ized that I
didn’t have any bad feel­ings toward him, but I also didn’t love him any­more. I
stopped sleep­ing in the same room with him. I just want­ed to cud­dle my kids. I
felt such a bond with them. I lit­er­al­ly closed the door to him.
My mom said, “That is hate­ful.”
“I’m sor­ry, I can’t help it,” I said. “I don’t love him any­more like that.”
He broke up with me, but I didn’t care because I’d fall­en out of love with
him. He wrote me a long let­ter and then he dis­ap­peared. He resigned as my co-
con­ser­va­tor when our rela­tion­ship end­ed. To me it seemed that he had
some­thing of an iden­ti­ty cri­sis. He put col­ored streaks in his hair and went to the
San­ta Mon­i­ca Pier and rode bikes every day with a bunch of tat­tooed dudes.
Hey, I get it. Now that I’m in my for­ties, I’m going through my own iden­ti­ty
cri­sis. I think it was just time for us to part ways.
The tours under the con­ser­va­tor­ship were strict­ly sober, so we weren’t allowed
to drink. Once, I end­ed up with most of the same dancers as Christi­na Aguil­era.
The dancers and I met up with Christi­na in Los Ange­les. She seemed pret­ty
messed up. But the dancers and I wound up swim­ming in a beau­ti­ful pool and
sit­ting in a Jacuzzi. It would have been nice to have drinks with them, to get
rebel­lious, sassy, fun. I wasn’t allowed to do that because my life had become a
Sun­day-school Bible church camp under the con­ser­va­tor­ship.
In some ways, they turned me into a teenag­er again; in oth­er ways, I was a
girl. But some­times I just felt like a trapped adult woman who was pissed o� all
the time. This is what’s hard to explain, how quick­ly I could vac­il­late between
being a lit­tle girl and being a teenag­er and being a woman, because of the way
they had robbed me of my free­dom. There was no way to behave like an adult,
since they wouldn’t treat me like an adult, so I would regress and act like a lit­tle
girl; but then my adult self would step back in—only my world didn’t allow me
to be an adult.
The woman in me was pushed down for a long time. They want­ed me to be
wild onstage, the way they told me to be, and to be a robot the rest of the time. I
felt like I was being deprived of those good secrets of life—those fun­da­men­tal
sup­posed sins of indul­gence and adven­ture that make us human. They want­ed
to take away that spe­cial­ness and keep every­thing as rote as pos­si­ble. It was death
to my cre­ativ­i­ty as an artist.

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 34
They took Slick to the Med­ical Uni­ver­si­ty on Tues­day. On
Wednes­day, they start­ed mak­ing vis­i­tors wear paper gowns and
masks.
“We don’t know pre­cise­ly what’s going on,” her doc­tor said. “She’s
got an autoim­mune dis­ease but it’s devel­op­ing faster than we’d
expect. Her immune sys­tem is attack­ing her white blood cells, and
more red blood cells than we’d like are hemolyt­ic. But we’re keep­ing
her oxy­genat­ed and screen­ing for every­thing. It’s too ear­ly to hit the
pan­ic but­ton.”
The diag­no­sis simul­ta­ne­ous­ly excit­ed and hor­ri­fied Patri­cia. It
con­firmed that what­ev­er James Har­ris was, he wasn’t human. He’d
put a part of him­self inside Slick, and it was killing her. He was a
mon­ster. On the oth­er hand, Slick wasn’t get­ting bet­ter.
Leland vis­it­ed every day around six, but always seemed like he
need­ed to leave the moment he arrived. When Patri­cia fol­lowed him
out into the hall to ask how he was doing, he stepped in close.
“You haven’t told any­one her diag­no­sis?” he asked.
“She doesn’t have one as far as I know,” Patri­cia said.
He stepped in clos­er. Patri­cia want­ed to back up but she was
already stand­ing against the wall.
“They say it’s an autoim­mune dis­ease,” he whis­pered. “You can’t
repeat that. Peo­ple are going to think she has AIDS.”
“No one’s going to think that, Leland,” Patri­cia said.
“They’re already say­ing it at church,” he said. “I don’t want it
com­ing back on the kids.”
“I haven’t said any­thing to any­one,” Patri­cia said, unhap­py to be
forced to par­tic­i­pate in some­thing that felt wrong.
Fri­day morn­ing, they taped a sign to Slick’s door that had been
pho­to­copied so many times it was cov­ered with black dots say­ing
that if you had a tem­per­a­ture, or been exposed to any­one with a cold,
you were not allowed in the room.
Slick looked pale, her skin felt papery, and she didn’t want to be
left alone, espe­cial­ly at night. The nurs­es brought blan­kets and
Patri­cia slept in the chair by her bed. After Leland went home,
Patri­cia held the phone so Slick could say bed­time prayers with her
kids, but most of the time Slick lay still, the sheets pulled up almost
to her chin, her doll-sized arms wrapped in white tape, pricked with
IV nee­dles and tubes. She sweat­ed out fevers most of the after­noon.
When she seemed lucid Patri­cia tried to read to her from Men Are
from Mars, Women Are from Venus, but after a para­graph she
real­ized Slick was say­ing some­thing.
“What’s that?” Patri­cia asked, lean­ing over.
“Anything…else…,” Slick said. “…anything…else.”
Patri­cia pulled the lat­est Ann Rule out of her purse.
“‘Sep­tem­ber 21, 1986,’” she read, “‘was a warm and beau­ti­ful
Sun­day in Portland—in the whole state of Ore­gon, for that mat­ter.
With any luck the win­ter rains of the North­west were a safe two
months away…’”
The facts and firm geog­ra­phy soothed Slick, who closed her eyes
and lis­tened. She didn’t sleep, just lay there, smil­ing slight­ly. The
light out­side got dim­mer and the light inside got stronger, and
Patri­cia kept read­ing, speak­ing loud­er to com­pen­sate for her paper
mask.
“Am I too late?” Maryellen said, and Patri­cia looked up to see her
push­ing open the door.
“Is she awake?” Maryellen whis­pered from behind her paper mask.
“Thank you for com­ing,” Slick said with­out open­ing her eyes.
“Every­one wants to know how you’re feel­ing,” Maryellen said. “I
know Kit­ty want­ed to come.”
“Are you read­ing this month’s book?” Slick asked.
Maryellen pulled a heavy brown arm­chair to the foot of the bed.
“I can’t even open it,” she said. “Men Are from Mars? That’s giv­ing
them too much cred­it.”
Slick start­ed cough­ing, and it took Patri­cia a moment to real­ize she
was laugh­ing.
“I made…,” Slick whis­pered, and Patri­cia and Maryellen strained
to hear her. “I made Patri­cia stop read­ing it.”
“I miss the books we used to read where at least there was a
mur­der,” Maryellen said. “The prob­lem with book club these days is
too many men. They don’t know how to pick a book to save their lives
and they love to lis­ten to them­selves talk. It’s noth­ing but opin­ions,
all day long.”
“You sound…sexist,” Slick whis­pered.
She was the only one not in a mask, so even though her voice was
weak­est, it sound­ed loud­est.
“I wouldn’t mind lis­ten­ing if any of them had an opin­ion worth a
damn,” Maryellen said.
With three of them in Slick’s lit­tle hos­pi­tal room, Patri­cia felt the
absence of the oth­er two more acute­ly. They felt like some kind of
sur­vivors’ club—the last three stand­ing.
“Are you going to Kitty’s oys­ter roast on Sat­ur­day?” she asked
Maryellen.
“If she has one,” Maryellen said. “The way she’s act­ing they might
call it off.”
“I haven’t spo­ken to her since before Hal­loween,” Patri­cia said.
“Give her a call when you have a chance,” Maryellen said.
“Something’s wrong. Horse says she hasn’t left the house all week
and yes­ter­day she bare­ly left her room. He’s wor­ried.”
“What does he say is wrong?” Patri­cia asked.
“He says it’s night­mares,” Maryellen said. “She’s drink­ing, a lot.
She wants to know where the chil­dren are every sec­ond of the day.
She’s scared some­thing might hap­pen to them.”
Patri­cia decid­ed it was time more peo­ple knew.
“Do you want to talk to Maryellen about any­thing?” she asked
Slick. “Do you have some­thing you need to tell her?”
Slick shook her head delib­er­ate­ly.
“No,” she croaked. “The doc­tors don’t know any­thing yet.”
Patri­cia leaned down.
“He can’t hurt you here,” she said, qui­et­ly. “You can tell her.”
“How is she?” a gen­tle, car­ing male voice said from the door.
Patri­cia hunched as if she’d been stabbed between the shoul­der
blades. Slick’s eyes widened. Patri­cia turned, and there was no
mis­tak­ing the eyes above the mask or the shape beneath the paper
gown.
“I’m sor­ry I didn’t come ear­li­er,” James Har­ris said through his
mask, mov­ing across the room. “Poor Slick. What’s hap­pened to
you?”
Patri­cia stood and put her­self between James Har­ris and Slick’s
bed. He stopped in front of her and placed one large hand on her
shoul­der. It took every­thing she had not to flinch.
“You’re so good to be here,” he said, and then gen­tly brushed her
aside and loomed over Slick, one hand rest­ing on her bed rail. “How
are you feel­ing, sweet­heart?”
What he was doing was obscene. Patri­cia want­ed to scream for
help, she want­ed the police, she want­ed him arrest­ed, but she knew
no one would help them. Then she real­ized Maryellen and Slick
weren’t say­ing any­thing, either.
“Do you not feel up to talk­ing?” James Har­ris asked Slick.
Patri­cia won­dered who would break first, which one of them would
cave in to niceties and make con­ver­sa­tion, but they all stood firm,
and looked at their hands, at their feet, out the win­dow, and none of
them said a word.
“I feel like I’m inter­rupt­ing,” James Har­ris said.
The silence con­tin­ued and Patri­cia felt some­thing big­ger than her
fear: sol­i­dar­i­ty.
“Slick’s tired,” Maryellen final­ly said. “She’s had a long day. I think
we should all leave her to get some rest.”
As every­one shuf­fled around each oth­er, try­ing to say good-bye,
try­ing to get to the door, try­ing to get their things, Patri­cia worked
spit into her dry mouth. She didn’t want to do what she was about to
do, but right before she said good-bye to Slick, she spoke as loud­ly as
she could.
“James?”
He turned, his eye­brows raised above his mask.
“Korey took my car,” she said. “Could you give me a ride home?”
Slick tried to push her­self up in bed.
“I’ll be back tomor­row,” she told Slick. “But I need to go home and
get some gro­ceries in the fridge and make sure the chil­dren are still
alive.”
“Of course,” James Har­ris said. “I’ll be hap­py to give you a ride.”
Patri­cia bent over Slick.
“I’ll see you soon,” she said, and kissed her on the fore­head.
Maryellen insist­ed on walk­ing with her to James Harris’s car,
which was on the third lev­el of the park­ing garage. Patri­cia
appre­ci­at­ed the ges­ture, but then came the moment when she had to
go.
“Well,” Maryellen said, like a bad actor on tele­vi­sion. “I thought I
was parked up here but I guess I was wrong again. You go on, I’ll
have to fig­ure out where I put my car.”
Patri­cia watched Maryellen walk to the stair­well until all she could
hear were her heels, and then those fad­ed, and the park­ing garage
was silent. The door locks chun­ked up and Patri­cia jumped. She
pulled the han­dle, slid self-con­scious­ly into the front seat, pulled the
door closed, and clicked her seat belt on. The car engine came to life,
idled, and then James Har­ris reached for her head. She flinched as
he put his hand on the back of her head­rest, looked over his
shoul­der, and reversed out of his space. They drove down the ramps
in silence, he paid the atten­dant, and they pulled out onto the dark
Charleston streets.
“I’m glad we can have this time togeth­er,” he said.
Patri­cia tried to say some­thing, but she couldn’t force air through
her throat.
“Do they have any idea what’s wrong with Slick?” he asked.
“An autoim­mune dis­or­der,” she man­aged.
“Leland thinks she has AIDS,” James Har­ris said. “He’s ter­ri­fied
peo­ple will find out.”
His turn sig­nal clicked loud­ly as he made a left onto Cal­houn
Street, past the park where the columns from the old Charleston
Muse­um still stood. They remind­ed Patri­cia of tomb­stones.
“You and I have been mak­ing a lot of assump­tions about each
oth­er,” James Har­ris said. “I think it’s time we got on the same
page.”
Patri­cia dug her nails into her palms to make her­self keep qui­et.
She had got­ten into his car. She didn’t need to talk.
“I would nev­er hurt any­one,” he said. “You know that, right?”
How much did he know? Had they cleaned his stairs com­plete­ly?
Did he know she’d been in his attic, or did he just sus­pect? Had she
missed a spot, left some­thing behind, giv­en her­self away?
“I know,” she said.
“Does Slick have any idea how she got this?” he asked.
Patri­cia bit the inside of her cheeks, feel­ing her teeth sink into
their soft, spongy tis­sue, mak­ing her­self more alert.
“No,” she said.
“What about you?” he asked. “What do you think?”
If he had attacked Slick, what would he do to her now that they
were alone? The posi­tion she’d put her­self in began to sink in. She
need­ed to reas­sure him that she was no dan­ger.
“I don’t know what to think,” she man­aged.
“At least you’re admit­ting it,” he said. “I find myself in a sim­i­lar
posi­tion.”
“What’s that?” she asked.
They mount­ed the Coop­er Riv­er Bridge, ris­ing in a smooth arc over
the city, leav­ing the land below, soar­ing over the dark har­bor. Traf­fic
was light, with only a few cars on the bridge.
The moment Patri­cia dread­ed was com­ing soon. At the end of the
bridge, the road forked. Two lanes curved toward the Old Vil­lage.
The oth­er two veered left and became John­nie Dodds Boule­vard,
run­ning out past strip malls, past Creek­side, out into the coun­try
where there were no street­lights or neigh­bors, deep into Fran­cis
Mar­i­on Nation­al For­est where there were hid­den clear­ings and
log­ging roads, places where occa­sion­al­ly the police found aban­doned
cars with dead bod­ies in the trunk, or babies’ skele­tons wrapped in
plas­tic bags and buried under the trees.
Which road he took would tell her if he thought she posed a threat.
“Leland did this to her,” James Har­ris said. “Leland made her
sick.”
Patricia’s thoughts frag­ment­ed. What was he say­ing? She tried to
pay atten­tion, but he was already talk­ing.
“It all start­ed with those damn trips,” he said. “If I’d known, I
nev­er would have sug­gest­ed them. It was that one last Feb­ru­ary to
Atlanta, do you remem­ber? Carter had that Rital­in con­fer­ence and
Leland and I went on Sun­day to take some of the doc­tors out golf­ing
and talk to them about invest­ing in Gra­cious Cay. At din­ner, this
psy­chi­a­trist from Reno asked if we want­ed to see some girls. He told
us there was a place called the Gold Club owned by a for­mer New
York Yan­kee, so it must be on the lev­el. It wasn’t my kind of thing,
but Leland spent almost a thou­sand dol­lars. That was the first time.
After that, it seemed to get eas­i­er for him.”
“Why are you telling me this?” Patri­cia asked.
“Because you need to know the truth,” he said, and they were
com­ing down the last rise of the bridge. Up ahead, the road
branched: right or left. “I became aware of the girls last sum­mer.
Leland would be with a dif­fer­ent one almost every trip. Some­times,
when it was places like Atlanta or Mia­mi where we went a few times,
he would see the same girl. Some of them were pro­fes­sion­als, some
weren’t. You know what I mean by that?”
He wait­ed. She nod­ded stiffly in acknowl­edg­ment, eyes on the
road. He drove in the mid­dle lane, which could go either way. She
won­dered if this was a full and final con­fes­sion because he knew she
wouldn’t be able to tell any­one soon.
“He got a dis­ease from one of them and gave it to Slick,” James
Har­ris said. “There’s no way to know what it is. But I know that’s
what hap­pened. I asked him once if he used pro­tec­tion and he just
laughed and said, ‘Where’s the fun in that?’ Some­one needs to tell
her doc­tor.
He didn’t put on his turn sig­nal to change lanes; his car just came
down off the bridge and then drift­ed, so slight­ly she almost didn’t
notice, and they were on the road to the Old Vil­lage. The mus­cles in
her back unclenched.
“What about Carter?” she asked, after a moment.
They rode Cole­man Boulevard’s gen­tle curves toward the Old
Vil­lage, pass­ing hous­es, street­lights, then stores, restau­rants, peo­ple.
“Him, too,” he said. “I’m sor­ry.”
She hadn’t expect­ed it to hurt so much.
“What do you want from me?” she asked.
“He’s treat­ed you like a fool,” James Har­ris said. “Carter doesn’t
see what a won­der­ful fam­i­ly he has, but I do. I have all along. I was
there when your moth­er-in-law passed, and she was a good woman.
I’ve watched Blue grow up and he’s hav­ing a hard time but he’s got so
much poten­tial. You’re a good per­son. But your hus­band has thrown
it all away.”
They passed the Oasis gas sta­tion in the mid­dle of the road and
entered the Old Vil­lage prop­er, the inte­ri­or of the car get­ting dark­er
as the street­lights became spaced far­ther apart.
“If Leland gave Slick some­thing,” he said, “Carter could do the
same to you. I’m sor­ry to be the one to tell you, but you need to
know. I want you to be safe. I care about you. I care about Blue and
Korey. Y’all are a big part of my life.”
He looked earnest as a suit­or ask­ing some­one to be his bride as he
turned from Pitt Street onto McCants.
“What are you say­ing?” she asked, lips numb.
“You deserve bet­ter,” he said. “You and the chil­dren deserve
some­one who knows your true val­ue.”
Her stom­ach slow­ly turned inside out. He passed Alham­bra Hall
and she want­ed to shove open the door and jump out of the car. She
want­ed to feel the asphalt slap and cut and scrape her. It would feel
real, not like this night­mare. She made her­self look at James Har­ris
again, but she didn’t trust her­self to speak. She kept qui­et until he
pulled up in front of her dri­ve­way.
“I need time to think,” she said.
“What are you going to tell Carter?” he asked.
“Noth­ing,” Patri­cia said, and made her face a mask. “Not yet. This
is between us.”
She fum­bled with the door han­dle, and as she did, she dropped
Francine’s license onto the floor of his car and slipped it beneath the
pas­sen­ger seat with her foot.
It wasn’t his wal­let, but it was the next best thing.
—
She woke up in the dark. She must have turned off the bed­side light
at some point and didn’t remem­ber. Now she lay there, scared to
move, stiff as a board, lis­ten­ing. What had wok­en her? Her ears
strained, scan­ning the dark­ness. She wished Carter were here, but he
was on anoth­er drug com­pa­ny trip to Hilton Head.
Her ears wan­dered through the dark house. She heard the high­er-
pitched heat com­ing through the air reg­is­ters, the tick­ing sound it
made deep in the tin ducts. Behind the tick­ing came the high-pitched
rush of warm air, and the drip from the bath­room faucet.
She thought about Blue. She need­ed to reach him, some­how,
before James Har­ris got him fur­ther under con­trol. He’d lied about a

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.

34
I couldn’t tell you why I went down to the lake.
Maybe it was because Tripp had stopped by, ask­ing if I want­ed a ride there, too, and I hadn’t
known Bea had invit­ed him.
Tripp and I hadn’t been friends or any­thing, but some­thing about it, about the girls (women, I heard
Jane say) going up there alone, then Bea tex­ting Tripp to join them … some­thing about it felt off.
I’d seen the way Tripp had been look­ing at Bea late­ly, with these sad pup­py-dog eyes. I told
myself it was because Blanche was mak­ing it so obvi­ous that she was into me. He’d trans­ferred
affec­tion or some shit.
But that didn’t mean I had to like it.
So, it had both­ered me, Bea invit­ing him, and long after Tripp left, I’d sat there in the liv­ing room,
think­ing about it, prob­ing it like a sore tooth.
Why would Bea want him there? She didn’t even like Tripp, and this was sup­posed to be some
kind of girls’ bond­ing week­end.

The house is dark and emp­ty when Eddie gets there.
Or he thinks it’s emp­ty. After stand­ing there in the liv­ing room, call­ing out to some­one, he
hears a snore from upstairs.
Tripp is in the guest room, passed out, his mouth open, his hand hang­ing off the bed. His snores
are deep, con­gest­ed, his breaths tak­ing a while to come, and some­thing about it strikes Eddie as
weird. Unnat­ur­al.
But then again, Tripp is a drunk, maybe this is how they all sound.
The boat is gone, and there are signs they’d all three been there—Blanche’s purse hang­ing up
by the door, Tripp’s keys on the counter, Bea’s overnight bag on one of the bar chairs by the
counter.
Stand­ing there in the liv­ing room, Eddie tells him­self he’d been a com­plete jack­ass, that the
girls had tak­en the boat out and were hav­ing a great time, and he’d let Blanche get to him with all
that shit about Bea’s mom.
Then he looks out the back door and sees her.
Bea. Walk­ing up the dock, soak­ing wet.
And Eddie knows.
And she had known he knew. He would remem­ber the look on her face for the rest of his life, the
way her jaw had clenched and her shoul­ders had gone back, head lift­ing as if to say, Try it,
moth­er­fuck­er.
And at first, Eddie makes the right deci­sion. Tak­ing her into his arms. Telling her he
under­stands. Blanche knew this hor­ri­ble thing about her, and she was telling peo­ple, what else
could Bea do? She was pro­tect­ing them, pro­tect­ing every­thing they’d built, and wasn’t she smart,
get­ting Tripp down here to take the fall? He was so drunk, they would say. He and Blanche got into
a fight, and he hit her, hit her so hard. Bea had tried to save her—Blanche was her best friend!—
but she’d been drink­ing, too, and it was so dark. She’d been so brave, div­ing into the water,
swim­ming away to get help.
Smil­ing at Eddie, Bea ris­es up on tip­toes and kiss­es him. “I knew you’d get it,” she says.
Which is when Eddie grabs her, his arm cut­ting off her air, her feet scrab­bling on the ground,
fin­gers tear­ing a but­ton off his shirt that he for­gets about until days lat­er, once Bea was safe in the
pan­ic room.
Safe.
That’s what he tells him­self.

I couldn’t turn her in, or let her go to prison. Not for a mur­der this cal­cu­lat­ed, not in a death-penal­ty
state, not when they might start ask­ing the same ques­tions about her moth­er that I’d been ask­ing.
(Not to men­tion that a tri­al would kill the busi­ness. No one wants charm­ing knick­knacks from a
mur­der­er.)
But I also couldn’t let her just do this, couldn’t stom­ach the thought that the next time some­one
failed to fall in line with what Bea want­ed, she’d just do away with them.
The pan­ic room had been a solu­tion.
Not the smartest, not the best, but fuck, what else could I have done?
Some of the pain was start­ing to recede now, or maybe I was just get­ting used to it. In any case, I
could move more now, and even though my stom­ach roiled again, I was able to sit up.
Jane.
I didn’t love her, not real­ly. I knew that now.
I’d want­ed to. So much. In the begin­ning, it had felt so easy. I could just love some­one else. I
could have a fresh start. I could put every­thing with Bea behind me, for­get what she’d done, what I’d
done, what we’d done, and start over with Jane. Smart, fun­ny Jane who saw the good parts of me,
nev­er the bad.
Bea had learned the truth about my fam­i­ly even­tu­al­ly. That I hadn’t spo­ken to my mom or my
broth­er since I was eigh­teen even though they were both good peo­ple who hadn’t done any­thing
wrong. Their only crime was that they were a reminder of how thor­ough­ly mediocre my begin­nings
had been.
Jane didn’t know that, though. She didn’t know that my mom still tried to email me through the
pub­lic address I had at South­ern Manors, or that I delet­ed them as soon as they came in. Or that when
my broth­er had tried to send us a Christ­mas card, I’d sicced our lawyers on him, imply­ing that he was
harass­ing us.
With Jane, I was get­ting a blank slate.
But a part of me had always known it was nev­er going to be that easy. I might’ve told myself that I
hid Bea away to pro­tect the busi­ness, that it was bet­ter the world think she was dead than a mur­der­er,
but the truth was … I couldn’t bear to give her up.
It was that sim­ple. That fuck­ing ter­ri­fy­ing.
I still loved her.
That’s what this had been, fucked up as it was. Love. Try­ing to save her from the out­side world—
and from her­self.
“This is the best thing for you,” I’d told her that first night when I’d put her in the pan­ic room as
she’d gaped at me, con­fused and angry, and maybe a lit­tle scared.
And I’d believed that. I still did. But Jesus, now she was loose, in the house with Jane, resilient
Jane who I should’ve let go from the start. She didn’t deserve this. I should nev­er have pro­posed to
her, not when I was still going into Bea’s room, see­ing her, talk­ing to her, sleep­ing with her. But I’d
want­ed to give Jane the thing she’d want­ed. I’d some­how, stu­pid­ly, thought this might work out. That

Chap­ter 34 of “The Ten­ant of Wild­fell Hall” by Anne Bron­të, titled “Con­ceal­ment,” delves into the com­plex emo­tion­al land­scape of the pro­tag­o­nist, who grap­ples with feel­ings of betray­al, hatred, and the daunt­ing prospect of her future. The chap­ter opens with a reflec­tion on how to endure the com­pa­ny of her hus­band and their guests, not­ing a dis­tinct shift in her feel­ings towards her husband—from love to an admis­sion of hate, under­scored by her res­o­lu­tion for no vengeance oth­er than his real­iza­tion of guilt.

The nar­ra­tive swift­ly moves to inter­ac­tions with Mr. Har­grave, who presents as both annoy­ing and seem­ing­ly con­sid­er­ate, forc­ing the pro­tag­o­nist into a fine bal­ance between polite­ness and the preser­va­tion of her dig­ni­ty. Despite Har­grave’s inten­tions, the pro­tag­o­nist rem­i­nisces about pre­vi­ous inter­ac­tions that affirm her dis­trust and resolve to remain vig­i­lant against his advances.

A sig­nif­i­cant part of the chap­ter revolves around the pro­tag­o­nist’s con­fronta­tion with Lady Low­bor­ough, who has been car­ry­ing on an affair with her hus­band. This con­fronta­tion is marked by the pro­tag­o­nist’s deci­sion to direct­ly address Lady Low­bor­ough’s behav­ior, lead­ing to a heat­ed exchange where per­son­al griev­ances and moral stand­ings are aired. Despite the ten­sion, the pro­tag­o­nist decides against dis­clos­ing the affair to either Lady Low­bor­ough’s hus­band or the wider pub­lic, act­ing from a place of prin­ci­ple rather than revenge or spite.

The chap­ter con­cludes with a stark exam­i­na­tion of per­son­al integri­ty and the con­se­quences of one’s actions, as seen through the pro­tag­o­nist’s inter­ac­tions and deci­sions regard­ing those around her. The emo­tion­al depth and moral quan­daries pre­sent­ed offer a nuanced explo­ration of themes such as betray­al, self-respect, and the com­plex­i­ties of human rela­tion­ships. The pro­tag­o­nist’s stance is clear: despite the pain and betray­al expe­ri­enced, her actions are guid­ed by a moral com­pass that seeks hon­esty, dig­ni­ty, and, above all, a preser­va­tion of her inner peace amidst the tur­moil.