In Chap­ter 44 of “We Solve Mur­ders,” the pro­tag­o­nists, Amy, Rosie, and Steve, nav­i­gate the scenic hills of St. Lucia dur­ing a taxi ride. Amidst the breath­tak­ing land­scapes, ten­sion brews between Amy and Steve as he fix­ates on his phone, con­cerned about roam­ing charges after read­ing alarm­ing sto­ries about exor­bi­tant bills. Despite Amy’s attempts to engage him in the beau­ty of their sur­round­ings, Steve remains pre­oc­cu­pied. Fer­dy, their dri­ver, reas­sures them of their safe­ty, shar­ing his expe­ri­ence of not hav­ing any fatal acci­dents.

As they ascend, trans­porta­tion shifts to prob­ing con­ver­sa­tions. Amy inquires about Fer­dy’s pro­fes­sion as a taxi dri­ver ver­sus being a politi­cian, high­light­ing the elec­toral loss­es that led him to this role. Their dia­logue turns to inves­ti­ga­tions con­cern­ing a com­pa­ny that has con­nec­tions to Felic­i­ty Wool­las­ton, a woman of inter­est. Steve shares insights, rais­ing ques­tions about Felic­i­ty’s age and the nature of her dig­i­tal media agency.

Rosie draws atten­tion to Ferdy’s con­nec­tion to the local com­mu­ni­ty, as chil­dren wave at him dur­ing the ride. They press him for infor­ma­tion regard­ing Bel­la Sanchez and a mys­te­ri­ous car crash. Fer­dy recalls the inci­dent, reveal­ing he wit­nessed a woman with long red hair in a base­ball cap involved in the crash, which adds a lay­er of sus­pi­cion link­ing to their ongo­ing inquiries.

The ride’s secu­ri­ty comes into ques­tion when Amy learns from Steve about his dis­turb­ing dis­cov­er­ies regard­ing a blood case involv­ing their friend Jeff, who is pre­sumed dead, leav­ing uncer­tain­ty about his fate. Amidst the rat­tling roads, Rosie injects humor, show­ing curios­i­ty about the local drug scene, which Fer­dy address­es with dark humor about poten­tial encoun­ters with a dan­ger­ous char­ac­ter named Nel­son Nunez.

As they close in on their des­ti­na­tion, Amy express­es a grow­ing deter­mi­na­tion to chase leads tying these events togeth­er, rec­og­niz­ing the poten­tial con­nec­tions between the mys­te­ri­ous dri­ver, the wom­an’s lug­gage, and their inves­ti­ga­tion, deliv­er­ing an excit­ing nar­ra­tive blend of ten­sion and intrigue in the Caribbean land­scape.

In Chap­ter 44 of “All the Col­ors of the Dark,” a con­ver­sa­tion unfolds between two char­ac­ters, focus­ing on the pro­tag­o­nist’s reflec­tions on his rela­tion­ships and the peo­ple in his life. The chap­ter opens with a ques­tion about whether any­one is seek­ing him, lead­ing to mem­o­ries of Chief Nix, a police offi­cer who had inter­vened in a trou­bling sit­u­a­tion involv­ing Ivy. This rec­ol­lec­tion sets the stage for explor­ing the pro­tag­o­nist’s con­nec­tions, par­tic­u­lar­ly with a girl named Saint.

He rem­i­nisces about Saint, appre­ci­at­ing her intel­li­gence and the way she effort­less­ly helped him with their home­work. He recalls inci­dents from their shared past, such as times spent in her com­pa­ny that brought him a sense of belong­ing and ful­fill­ment. He val­ues these moments, detail­ing how he con­tributed to their house­hold by tak­ing care of their yard and paint­ing their win­dows, actions that made him feel wor­thy of their hos­pi­tal­i­ty.

The pro­tag­o­nist express­es his deep admi­ra­tion for Saint, describ­ing her phys­i­cal appear­ance and her musi­cal tal­ent, not­ing how her piano play­ing cap­ti­vates him. The dis­cus­sion shifts to her fam­i­ly his­to­ry, reveal­ing the painful cir­cum­stances sur­round­ing her moth­er’s death and her father’s aban­don­ment. This back­sto­ry empha­sizes the strength and vul­ner­a­bil­i­ty of Saint, mak­ing his feel­ings toward her more com­plex.

A poignant moment aris­es when he dis­miss­es the idea that Saint loves him, attribut­ing her kind­ness to pity rather than gen­uine affec­tion. Despite her evi­dent com­pas­sion, he fears that his absence will reveal a void in her life. He artic­u­lates a sense of loss, sug­gest­ing that he has lit­tle to offer but also acknowl­edg­ing the impact of their rela­tion­ship.

As the chap­ter pro­gress­es, the atmos­phere grows inti­mate when the pro­tag­o­nist asks for the oth­er char­ac­ter’s name. She whis­pers “Grace,” cre­at­ing a con­nec­tion between them just as he finds solace in their inter­ac­tion. This moment encap­su­lates the cen­tral themes of love, long­ing, and the regret entwined in the pro­tag­o­nist’s reflec­tions. The chap­ter clos­es with a sense of unre­solved emo­tions and the stark real­i­ty of the dif­fi­cul­ties he faces, both inter­nal­ly and exter­nal­ly.

Chap­ter Forty-Four nar­rates a reflec­tive moment between Nina and her ther­a­pist, Dr. Hewitt, high­light­ing her fears and attempts at recov­er­ing from a trau­mat­ic delu­sion. Hav­ing been dis­charged from Clearview, Nina has spent four months under Dr. Hewitt’s care, a choice influ­enced by Andy’s moth­er despite Nina’s ini­tial reser­va­tions. The nar­ra­tive delves into Nina’s strug­gle with a spe­cif­ic fear: the attic of her house, which she has avoid­ed since her return home. She con­fess­es to Dr. Hewitt about her irra­tional but intense fear that once over­whelmed her, mak­ing her believe in her own bizarre nar­ra­tives of per­se­cu­tion by Andy, her hus­band.

Dr. Hewitt sug­gests that con­fronting the attic could be ther­a­peu­tic, help­ing Nina reclaim pow­er over her fear by see­ing it as noth­ing more than a stor­age space. Despite Andy’s sup­port­ive stance and encour­age­ment to face her fear, Nina remains hes­i­tant, reflect­ing on the com­plex­i­ties of her emo­tions and the rocky jour­ney towards heal­ing.

After the ses­sion, Andy takes Nina home, dis­play­ing unwa­ver­ing sup­port and dis­cussing her progress. This brings to light Nina’s guilt and appre­hen­sion toward her rela­tion­ship with her fam­i­ly, espe­cial­ly her daugh­ter, Cece, and her inter­ac­tion with Eve­lyn, Andy’s moth­er. The chap­ter paints a vivid pic­ture of a fam­i­ly nav­i­gat­ing the tur­bu­lent waters of men­tal health recov­ery, under­scored by themes of trust, fear, and the path to heal­ing. The nar­ra­tive empha­sizes Nina’s inter­nal strug­gles, her inter­ac­tions with sig­nif­i­cant oth­ers, and the steps, how­ev­er small, towards over­com­ing her fears. The chap­ter ends with a seem­ing­ly mun­dane but telling inter­ac­tion involv­ing Eve­lyn, high­light­ing the under­cur­rents of ten­sion and expec­ta­tions with­in the fam­i­ly.

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
44
But despite the let­ter, despite the mess between us, as I gaped at the mir­ror
an hour lat­er, I couldn’t quite believe what stared back.
I had been so relieved these past few weeks to be sleep­ing at all that I’d
for­got­ten to be grate­ful that I was keep­ing down my food.
The full­ness had come back to my face, my body. What should have
tak­en weeks longer as a human had been hur­ried along by the mir­a­cle of my
immor­tal blood. And the dress …
I’d nev­er worn any­thing like it, and doubt­ed I’d ever wear any­thing like
it again.
Craft­ed of tiny blue gems so pale they were almost white, it clung to
every curve and hol­low before drap­ing to the floor and pool­ing like liq­uid
starlight. The long sleeves were tight, capped at the wrists with cuffs of
pure dia­mond. The neck­line grazed my col­lar­bones, the mod­esty of it
undone by how the gown hugged areas I sup­posed a female might enjoy
show­ing off. My hair had been swept off my face with two combs of sil­ver
and dia­mond, then left to drape down my back. And I thought, as I stood
alone in my bed­room, that I might have looked like a fall­en star.
Rhysand was nowhere to be found when I worked up the courage to go to
the rooftop gar­den. The bead­ing on the dress clinked and hissed against the
floors as I walked through the near­ly dark house, all the lights soft­ened or
extin­guished.
In fact, the whole city had blown out its lights.
A winged, mus­cled fig­ure stood atop the roof, and my heart stum­bled.
But then he turned, just as the scent hit me. And some­thing in my chest
sank a bit as Cass­ian let out a low whis­tle. “I should have let Nuala and
Cer­rid­wen dress me.”
I didn’t know whether to smile or wince. “You look rather good despite
it.” He did. He was out of his fight­ing clothes and armor, sport­ing a black
tunic cut to show off that warrior’s body. His black hair had been brushed
and smoothed, and even his wings looked clean­er.
Cass­ian held his arms out. His Siphons remained—a met­al, fin­ger­less
gaunt­let that stretched beneath the tai­lored sleeves of his jack­et. “Ready?”
He’d kept me com­pa­ny the past two days, train­ing me each morn­ing.
While he’d shown me more par­tic­u­lars on how to use an Illyr­i­an blade—
most­ly how to dis­em­bow­el some­one with it—we’d chat­ted about
every­thing: our equal­ly mis­er­able lives as chil­dren, hunt­ing, food …
Every­thing, that is, except for the sub­ject of Rhysand.
Cass­ian had men­tioned only once that Rhys was up at the House, and I
sup­posed my expres­sion had told him enough about not want­i­ng to hear
any­thing else. He grinned at me now. “With all those gems and beads, you
might be too heavy to car­ry. I hope you’ve been prac­tic­ing your win­now­ing
in case I drop you.”
“Fun­ny.” I allowed him to scoop me into his arms before we shot into the
sky. Win­now­ing might still evade me, but I wished I had wings, I real­ized.
Great, pow­er­ful wings so I might fly as they did; so I might see the world
and all it had to offer.
Below us, every lin­ger­ing light winked out. There was no moon; no
music flit­ted through the streets. Silence—as if wait­ing for some­thing.
Cass­ian soared through the qui­et dark to where the House of Wind
loomed. I could make out crowds gath­ered on the many bal­conies and
patios only from the faint gleam of starlight on their hair, then the clink of
their glass­es and low chat­ter as we neared.
Cass­ian set me down on the crowd­ed patio off the din­ing room, only a
few rev­el­ers both­er­ing to look at us. Dim bowls of fae­light inside the House
illu­mi­nat­ed spreads of food and end­less rows of green bot­tles of sparkling
wine atop the tables. Cass­ian was gone and returned before I missed him,
press­ing a glass of the lat­ter into my hand. No sign of Rhysand.
Maybe he’d avoid me the entire par­ty.
Some­one called Cassian’s name from down the patio, and he clapped me
on the shoul­der before strid­ing off. A tall male, his face in shad­ow, clasped
fore­arms with Cass­ian, his white teeth gleam­ing in the dark­ness. Azriel
stood with the stranger already, his wings tucked in tight to keep rev­el­ers
from knock­ing into them. He, Cass­ian, and Mor had all been qui­et today—
under­stand­ably so. I scanned for signs of my oth­er—
Friends.
The word sound­ed in my head. Was that what they were?
Amren was nowhere in sight, but I spot­ted a gold­en head at the same
moment she spied me, and Mor breezed to my side. She wore a gown of
pure white, lit­tle more than a slip of silk that showed off her gen­er­ous
curves. Indeed, a glance over her shoul­der revealed Azriel star­ing bla­tant­ly
at the back view of it, Cass­ian and the stranger already too deep in
con­ver­sa­tion to notice what had drawn the spymaster’s atten­tion. For a
moment, the rav­en­ous hunger on Azriel’s face made my stom­ach tight­en.
I’d remem­bered feel­ing like that. Remem­bered how it felt to yield to it.
How I’d come close to doing that the oth­er night.
Mor said, “It won’t be long now.”
“Until what?” No one had told me what to expect, as they hadn’t want­ed
to ruin the sur­prise of Star­fall.
“Until the fun.”
I sur­veyed the par­ty around us—“This isn’t the fun?”
Mor lift­ed an eye­brow. “None of us real­ly care about this part. Once it
starts, you’ll see.” She took a sip of her sparkling wine. “That’s some dress.
You’re lucky Amren is hid­ing in her lit­tle attic, or she’d prob­a­bly steal it
right off you. The vain drake.”
“She won’t take time off from decod­ing?”
“Yes, and no. Some­thing about Star­fall dis­turbs her, she claims. Who
knows? She prob­a­bly does it to be con­trary.”
Even as she spoke, her words were distant—her face a bit tight. I said
qui­et­ly, “Are you … ready for tomor­row?” Tomor­row, when we’d leave
Velaris to keep any­one from notic­ing our move­ments in this area. Mor,
Azriel had told me tight­ly over break­fast that morn­ing, would return to the
Court of Night­mares. To check in on her father’s … recov­ery.
Prob­a­bly not the best place to dis­cuss our plans, but Mor shrugged. “I
don’t have any choice but to be ready. I’ll come with you to the camp, then
go my way after­ward.”
“Cass­ian will be hap­py about that,” I said. Even if Azriel was the one
try­ing his best not to stare at her.
Mor snort­ed. “Maybe.”
I lift­ed a brow. “So you two … ?”
Anoth­er shrug. “Once. Well, not even. I was sev­en­teen, he wasn’t even a
year old­er.”
When every­thing had hap­pened.
But there was no dark­ness on her face as she sighed. “Caul­dron, that was
a long time ago. I vis­it­ed Rhys for two weeks when he was train­ing in the
war-camp, and Cass­ian, Azriel, and I became friends. One night, Rhys and
his moth­er had to go back to the Night Court, and Azriel went with them, so
Cass­ian and I were left alone. And that night, one thing led to anoth­er, and
… I want­ed Cass­ian to be the one who did it. I want­ed to choose.” A third
shrug. I won­dered if Azriel had wished to be the one she chose instead. If
he’d ever admit­ted to it to Mor—or Rhys. If he resent­ed that he’d been
away that night, that Mor hadn’t con­sid­ered him.
“Rhys came back the next morn­ing, and when he learned what had
hap­pened … ” She laughed under her breath. “We try not to talk about the
Inci­dent. He and Cass­ian … I’ve nev­er seen them fight like that. Hope­ful­ly
I nev­er will again. I know Rhys wasn’t pissed about my vir­gin­i­ty, but rather
the dan­ger that los­ing it had put me in. Azriel was even angri­er about it—
though he let Rhys do the wal­lop­ing. They knew what my fam­i­ly would do
for debas­ing myself with a bas­tard-born less­er faerie.” She brushed a hand
over her abdomen, as if she could feel that nail they’d spiked through it.
“They were right.”
“So you and Cass­ian,” I said, want­i­ng to move on from it, that dark­ness,
“you were nev­er togeth­er again after that?”
“No,” Mor said, laugh­ing qui­et­ly. “I was des­per­ate, reck­less that night.
I’d picked him not just for his kind­ness, but also because I want­ed my first
time to be with one of the leg­endary Illyr­i­an war­riors. I want­ed to lie with
the great­est of Illyr­i­an war­riors, actu­al­ly. And I’d tak­en one look at Cass­ian
and known. After I got what I want­ed, after … every­thing, I didn’t like that
it caused a rift with him and Rhys, or even him and Az, so … nev­er again.”
“And you were nev­er with any­one after it?” Not the cold, beau­ti­ful
shad­owsinger who tried so hard not to watch her with long­ing on his face?
“I’ve had lovers,” Mor clar­i­fied, “but … I get bored. And Cass­ian has
had them, too, so don’t get that unre­quit­ed-love, moony-woo-woo look. He
just wants what he can’t have, and it’s irri­tat­ed him for cen­turies that I
walked away and nev­er looked back.”
“Oh, it dri­ves him insane,” Rhys said from behind me, and I jumped. But
the High Lord was cir­cling me. I crossed my arms as he paused and
smirked. “You look like a woman again.”
“You real­ly know how to com­pli­ment females, cousin,” Mor said, and
pat­ted him on the shoul­der as she spot­ted an acquain­tance and went to say
hel­lo.
I tried not to look at Rhys, who was in a black jack­et, casu­al­ly
unbut­toned at the top so that the white shirt beneath—also unbut­toned at the
neck—showed the tat­toos on his chest peek­ing through. Tried not to look—
and failed.
“Do you plan to ignore me some more?” I said cool­ly.
“I’m here now, aren’t I? I wouldn’t want you to call me a hate­ful cow­ard
again.”
I opened my mouth, but felt all the wrong words start to come out. So I
shut it and looked for Azriel or Cass­ian or any­one who might talk to me.
Going up to a stranger was start­ing to sound appeal­ing when Rhys said a bit
hoarse­ly, “I wasn’t pun­ish­ing you. I just … I need­ed time.”
I didn’t want to have this con­ver­sa­tion here—with so many peo­ple
lis­ten­ing. So I ges­tured to the par­ty and said, “Will you please tell me what
this … gath­er­ing is about?”
Rhysand stepped up behind me, snort­ing as he said into my ear, “Look
up.”
Indeed, as I did so, the crowd hushed.
“No speech for your guests?” I mur­mured. Easy—I just want­ed it to be
easy between us again.
“Tonight’s not about me, though my pres­ence is appre­ci­at­ed and not­ed,”
he said. “Tonight’s about that.”
As he point­ed …
A star vault­ed across the sky, brighter and clos­er than any I’d seen
before. The crowd and city below cheered, rais­ing their glass­es as it passed
right over­head, and only when it had dis­ap­peared over the curve of the
hori­zon did they drink deeply.
I leaned back a step into Rhys—and quick­ly stepped away, out of his heat
and pow­er and scent. We’d done enough dam­age in a sim­i­lar posi­tion at the
Court of Night­mares.
Anoth­er star crossed the sky, twirling and twist­ing over itself, as if it
were rev­el­ing in its own sparkling beau­ty. It was chased by anoth­er, and
anoth­er, until a brigade of them were unleashed from the edge of the
hori­zon, like a thou­sand archers had loosed them from mighty bows.
The stars cas­cad­ed over us, fill­ing the world with white and blue light.
They were like liv­ing fire­works, and my breath lodged in my throat as the
stars kept on falling and falling.
I’d nev­er seen any­thing so beau­ti­ful.
And when the sky was full with them, when the stars raced and danced
and flowed across the world, the music began.
Wher­ev­er they were, peo­ple began danc­ing, sway­ing and twirling, some
grab­bing hands and spin­ning, spin­ning, spin­ning to the drums, the strings,
the glit­ter­ing harps. Not like the grind­ing and thrust­ing of the Court of
Night­mares, but—joyous, peace­ful danc­ing. For the love of sound and
move­ment and life.
I lin­gered with Rhysand at the edge of it, caught between watch­ing the
peo­ple danc­ing on the patio, hands upraised, and the stars stream­ing past,
clos­er and clos­er until I swore I could have touched them if I’d leaned out.
And there were Mor and Azriel—and Cass­ian. The three of them danc­ing
togeth­er, Mor’s head tipped back to the sky, arms up, the starlight gleam­ing
on the pure white of her gown. Danc­ing as if it might be her last time,
flow­ing between Azriel and Cass­ian like the three of them were one unit,
one being.
I looked behind me to find Rhys watch­ing them, his face soft. Sad.
Sep­a­rat­ed for fifty years, and reunited—only to be cleaved apart so soon
to fight again for their free­dom.
Rhys caught my gaze and said, “Come. There’s a bet­ter view. Qui­eter,”
He held a hand out to me.
That sor­row, that weight, lin­gered in his eyes. And I couldn’t bear to see
it—just as I couldn’t bear to see my three friends danc­ing togeth­er as if it
was the last time they’d ever do it.
Rhys led me to a small pri­vate bal­cony jut­ting from the upper lev­el of the
House of Wind. On the patios below, the music still played, the peo­ple still
danced, the stars wheel­ing by, close and swift.
He let go as I took a seat on the bal­cony rail. I imme­di­ate­ly decid­ed
against it as I beheld the drop, and backed away a healthy step.
Rhys chuck­led. “If you fell, you know I’d both­er to save you before you
hit the ground.”
“But not until I was close to death?”
“Maybe.”
I leaned a hand against the rail, peer­ing at the stars whizzing past. “As
pun­ish­ment for what I said to you?”
“I said some hor­ri­ble things, too,” he mur­mured.
“I didn’t mean it,” I blurt­ed. “I meant it more about myself than you. And
I’m sor­ry.”
He watched the stars for a moment before he replied. “You were right,
though. I stayed away because you were right. Though I’m glad to hear my
absence felt like a pun­ish­ment.”
I snort­ed, but was grate­ful for the humor—for the way he’d always been
able to amuse me. “Any news with the orb or the queens?”
“Noth­ing yet. We’re wait­ing for them to deign to reply.”
We were silent again, and I stud­ied the stars. “They’re not—they’re not
stars at all.”
“No.” Rhys came up beside me at the rail. “Our ances­tors thought they
were, but … They’re just spir­its, on a year­ly migra­tion to some­where. Why
they pick this day to appear here, no one knows.”
I felt his eyes upon me, and tore my gaze from the shoot­ing stars. Light
and shad­ow passed over his face. The cheers and music of the city far, far
below were bare­ly audi­ble over the crowd gath­ered at the House.
“There must be hun­dreds of them,” I man­aged to say, drag­ging my stare
back to the stars whizzing past.
“Thou­sands,” he said. “They’ll keep com­ing until dawn. Or, I hope they
will. There were less and less of them the last time I wit­nessed Star­fall.”
Before Ama­ran­tha had locked him away.
“What’s hap­pen­ing to them?” I looked in time to see him shrug.
Some­thing twanged in my chest.
“I wish I knew. But they keep com­ing back despite it.”
“Why?”
“Why does any­thing cling to some­thing? Maybe they love wher­ev­er
they’re going so much that it’s worth it. Maybe they’ll keep com­ing back,
until there’s only one star left. Maybe that one star will make the trip
for­ev­er, out of the hope that someday—if it keeps com­ing back often
enough—another star will find it again.”
I frowned at the wine in my hand. “That’s … a very sad thought.”
“Indeed.” Rhys rest­ed his fore­arms on the bal­cony edge, close enough for
my fin­gers to touch if I dared.
A calm, full silence enveloped us. Too many words—I still had too many
words in me.
I don’t know how much time passed, but it must have been a while,
because when he spoke again, I jolt­ed. “Every year that I was Under the
Moun­tain and Star­fall came around, Ama­ran­tha made sure that I …
ser­viced her. The entire night. Star­fall is no secret, even to outsiders—even
the Court of Night­mares crawls out of the Hewn City to look up at the sky.
So she knew … She knew what it meant to me.”
I stopped hear­ing the cel­e­bra­tions around us. “I’m sor­ry.” It was all I
could offer.
“I got through it by remind­ing myself that my friends were safe; that
Velaris was safe. Noth­ing else mat­tered, so long as I had that. She could use
my body how­ev­er she want­ed. I didn’t care.”
“So why aren’t you down there with them?” I asked, even as I tucked the
hor­ror of what had been done to him into my heart.
“They don’t know—what she did to me on Star­fall. I don’t want it to ruin
their night.”
“I don’t think it would. They’d be hap­py if you let them shoul­der the
bur­den.”
“The same way you rely on oth­ers to help with your own trou­bles?”
We stared at each oth­er, close enough to share breath.
And maybe all those words bot­tled up in me … Maybe I didn’t need
them right now.
My fin­gers grazed his. Warm and sturdy—patient, as if wait­ing to see
what else I might do. Maybe it was the wine, but I stroked a fin­ger down
his.
And as I turned to him more ful­ly, some­thing blind­ing and tin­kling
slammed into my face.
I reeled back, cry­ing out as I bent over, shield­ing my face against the
light that I could still see against my shut eyes.
Rhys let out a star­tled laugh.
A laugh.
And when I real­ized that my eyes hadn’t been singed out of their sock­ets,
I whirled on him. “I could have been blind­ed!” I hissed, shov­ing him. He
took a look at my face and burst out laugh­ing again. Real laugh­ter, open and
delight­ed and love­ly.
I wiped at my face, and when I pulled my hands down, I gaped. Pale
green light—like drops of paint—glowed in flecks on my hand.
Splat­tered star-spir­it. I didn’t know if I should be hor­ri­fied or amused. Or
dis­gust­ed.
When I went to rub it off, Rhys caught my hands. “Don’t,” he said, still
laugh­ing. “It looks like your freck­les are glow­ing.”
My nos­trils flared, and I went to shove him again, not car­ing if my new
strength knocked him off the bal­cony. He could sum­mon wings; he could
deal with it.
He side­stepped me, veer­ing toward the bal­cony rail, but not fast enough
to avoid the careen­ing star that col­lid­ed with the side of his face.
He leaped back with a curse. I laughed, the sound rasp­ing out of me. Not
a chuck­le or snort, but a cack­ling laugh.
And I laughed again, and again, as he low­ered his hands from his eyes.
The entire left side of his face had been hit.
Like heav­en­ly war paint, that’s what it looked like. I could see why he
didn’t want me to wipe mine away.
Rhys was exam­in­ing his hands, cov­ered in the dust, and I stepped toward
him, peer­ing at the way it glowed and glit­tered.
He went still as death as I took one of his hands in my own and traced a
star shape on the top of his palm, play­ing with the glim­mer and shad­ows,
until it looked like one of the stars that had hit us.
His fin­gers tight­ened on mine, and I looked up. He was smil­ing at me.
And looked so un-High-Lord-like with the glow­ing dust on the side of his
face that I grinned back.
I hadn’t even real­ized what I’d done until his own smile fad­ed, and his
mouth part­ed slight­ly.
“Smile again,” he whis­pered.
I hadn’t smiled for him. Ever. Or laughed. Under the Moun­tain, I had
nev­er grinned, nev­er chuck­led. And after­ward …
And this male before me … my friend …
For all that he had done, I had nev­er giv­en him either. Even when I had
just … I had just paint­ed some­thing. On him. For him.
I’d—painted again.
So I smiled at him, broad and with­out restraint.
“You’re exquis­ite,” he breathed.
The air was too tight, too close between our bod­ies, between our joined
hands. But I said, “You owe me two thoughts—back from when I first came
here. Tell me what you’re think­ing.”
Rhys rubbed his neck. “You want to know why I didn’t speak or see you?
Because I was so con­vinced you’d throw me out on my ass. I just … ” He
dragged a hand through his hair, and huffed a laugh. “I fig­ured hid­ing was a
bet­ter alter­na­tive.”
“Who would have thought the High Lord of the Night Court could be
afraid of an illit­er­ate human?” I purred. He grinned, nudg­ing me with an
elbow. “That’s one,” I pushed. “Tell me anoth­er thought.”
His eyes fell on my mouth. “I’m wish­ing I could take back that kiss
Under the Moun­tain.”
I some­times for­got that kiss, when he’d done it to keep Ama­ran­tha from
know­ing that Tam­lin and I had been in the for­got­ten hall, tan­gled up
togeth­er. Rhysand’s kiss had been bru­tal, demand­ing, and yet … “Why?”
His gaze set­tled on the hand I’d paint­ed instead, as if it were eas­i­er to
face. “Because I didn’t make it pleas­ant for you, and I was jeal­ous and
pissed off, and I knew you hat­ed me.”
Dan­ger­ous ter­ri­to­ry, I warned myself.
No. Hon­esty, that’s what it was. Hon­esty, and trust. I’d nev­er had that
with any­one.
Rhys looked up, meet­ing my gaze. And what­ev­er was on my face—I
think it might have been mir­rored on his: the hunger and long­ing and
sur­prise.

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.

J UST BEFORE SHOOTING WAS SET to com­mence, Har­ry turned forty-
five. He said he didn’t want a big night out or any sort of for­mal plans.
He just want­ed a nice day with all of us.
So John, Celia, and I planned a pic­nic in the park. Luisa packed us
lunch. Celia made san­gria. John went down to the sport­ing-goods store
and got us an extra-large umbrel­la to shade us from not only the sun
but also passers­by. On the way home, he got the bright idea to buy us
wigs and sun­glass­es, too.
That after­noon, the three of us told Har­ry we had a sur­prise for
him, and we led him into the park, Con­nor rid­ing on his back. She
loved to be strapped to him. She would laugh as he bounced her while
he walked.
I took his hand and dragged him with us.
“Where are we going?” he said. “Some­one at least give me a hint.”
“I’ll give you a small one,” Celia said as we were cross­ing Fifth
Avenue.
“No,” John said, shak­ing his head. “No hints. He’s too good with
hints. It takes all the fun out of it.”
“Con­nor, where is every­one tak­ing Dad­dy?” Har­ry said. I watched
as Con­nor laughed at the sound of her name.
When Celia walked through the entrance to the park, not even a
block from our apart­ment, Har­ry spot­ted the blan­ket already set out
with the umbrel­la and the pic­nic bas­kets, and he smiled.
“A pic­nic?” he said.
“Sim­ple fam­i­ly pic­nic. Just the five of us,” I said.
Har­ry smiled. He closed his eyes for a moment. As if he’d reached
heav­en. “Absolute­ly per­fect,” he said.
“I made the san­gria,” Celia said. “Luisa made the food, obvi­ous­ly.”

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.

44
When I �nal­ly returned to my home and my dogs and my kids, I was ecsta­t­ic.
Guess who want­ed to come vis­it me the �rst week I was back? My fam­i­ly.
“We’re so proud of you, Brit­ney!” my dad said. “You did it! Now we all want
to come and stay with you.” But by this point, I could ful­ly see through his
bull­shit. I knew what he was real­ly say­ing was: “I can’t wait to see your mon­ey—
I mean, you!”
And so they came—my father, my mom, and my sis­ter, with her daugh­ters,
Mad­die and Ivey.
I was a shell of myself. I was still on lithi­um, which made my sense of time
real­ly hazy. And I was scared. It crossed my mind that they were only vis­it­ing to
�nish o� what they’d start­ed a few months ear­li­er, to kill me for real. If that
sounds para­noid, con­sid­er all the things I’d been through up until this point—
the ways in which they had deceived and insti­tu­tion­al­ized me.
And so I played the game. If I’m nice to them, they won’t ever try to kill me
again, I thought.
For three and a half months, I’d had bare­ly a hug from any­body.
It makes me want to cry, how strong my lit­tle heart had to be.
But my fam­i­ly walked into my house like noth­ing had hap­pened. Like I
hadn’t just endured an almost unbear­able trau­ma in that place. “Oh, hey girl,
what you doing?” Jamie Lynn said, sound­ing chip­per.
She and my moth­er and the girls were always hang­ing around in my kitchen.
Jamie Lynn had sched­uled all these TV show meet­ings when she was in Los
Ange­les. My dad would go with her to the meet­ings in Hol­ly­wood, and she’d
come back loud and hap­py. “What’s up, boys?” she’d shout, walk­ing into the
kitchen and see­ing my sons.
She’d real­ly found her mojo. I was hap­py for her. At the same time, I didn’t
par­tic­u­lar­ly want to be around it just then.
“Oh my God, I have this real­ly great idea for me and you!” she’d say after
com­ing back from yet anoth­er meet­ing as I leaned, prac­ti­cal­ly comatose, against
the coun­ter­top. “Get this—a sis­ter talk show!” Every time she spoke, it was a
new scheme. A sit­com! A rom-com!
She talked for what felt like hours at a time while I looked at the �oor and
lis­tened. And the phrase echo­ing around my head was What the fuck is going on?
Once my fam­i­ly left my house after that ter­ri­ble vis­it, I start­ed to real­ly feel what
I’d been through. And I was left with noth­ing but a blind rage. They’d pun­ished
me. For what? For sup­port­ing them since I was a child?
How had I man­aged not to kill myself in that place, put myself out of my
mis­ery like you’d shoot a lame horse? I believe that almost any­one else in my
sit­u­a­tion would have.
Think­ing about how close I came to doing just that, I wept. Then some­thing
hap­pened to knock me out of my stu­por.
That August, my father was argu­ing with Sean Pre­ston, who was thir­teen at
the time. My son went to lock him­self in a bed­room to end the �ght, and my dad
broke down the door and shook him. Kevin �led a police report, and my father
was barred from see­ing the kids.
I knew I had to sum­mon one more round of strength, to �ght one last time.
It had been such a long road. Of �nding faith and los­ing it again. Of being
pushed down and get­ting back up. Of chas­ing free­dom only for it to slip right
out of my grasp.
If I was strong enough to sur­vive every­thing I’d sur­vived, I could take a
chance and ask for just a lit­tle bit more from God. I was going to ask, with every
bit of my moth­er­fuck­ing blood and skin, for the end of the con­ser­va­tor­ship.
Because I didn’t want those peo­ple run­ning my life any­more. I didn’t even
want them in my god­damn kitchen.
I didn’t want them to have the pow­er to keep me from my chil­dren or from
my house or from my dogs or from my car ever, ever again.

Octo­ber 24th marks the nar­ra­tor’s escape from a trou­bled life to safe­ty and free­dom. With the help of their trust­ed ser­vant Ben­son, they leave their old home stealth­ily in the ear­ly hours. The depar­ture pro­vides relief and joy, sym­bol­ized by their exit from the park. They dress in a way to avoid recog­ni­tion and embark on a long jour­ney to their new home, miles away from their past trou­bles, accom­pa­nied by child Arthur and their faith­ful friend Rachel.

They arrive at their new res­i­dence, a famil­iar yet des­o­late place, with only a small por­tion of it pre­pared for imme­di­ate liv­ing. Fur­nished with min­i­mal essen­tials pro­vid­ed by Fred­er­ick, the nar­ra­tor’s broth­er, it includes a kitchen, bed­rooms, and a space for work. This move sig­ni­fies a fresh start, away from a tor­ment­ed past, towards a hope­ful future, with the com­pa­ny of dear ones, though not with­out fears of being dis­cov­ered by Mr. Hunt­ing­don, the nar­ra­tor’s hus­band, who seeks not her but their child.

The nar­ra­tive reveals the nar­ra­tor’s deter­mi­na­tion to main­tain inde­pen­dence and avoid return­ing to her hus­band, empha­siz­ing her will­ing­ness to endure hard­ships for the sake of her child’s well-being. There are men­tions of ten­ta­tive social engage­ments and the strug­gle to fend off curios­i­ty from neigh­bors, under­ly­ing the con­stant fear of her past catch­ing up.

The diary recounts the unwa­ver­ing resolve to start anew despite lim­it­ed resources and the loom­ing threat of dis­cov­ery by Mr. Hunt­ing­don. It also high­lights the val­ue of soli­tude and self-reliance, as the nar­ra­tor painstak­ing­ly sets up her new home and life with the hope of free­dom and a brighter future for her child, amid the chal­lenges posed by her past life and her hus­band’s pur­suit. The chap­ter ends abrupt­ly with an unfin­ished acquain­tance, leav­ing read­ers in sus­pense about the unfold­ing dynam­ics in the nar­ra­tor’s new life.