Ch. 9: Rules of the Game

Rain traced long silver lines down the window, and somewhere a clock counted the hours.

For a heartbeat the careful distance between them thinned to nothing at all. Sophia crossed the room slowly, aware of every step, of the way she was watching without seeming to.

Money could buy a great many things, she had learned, but never the one thing that was wanted most. Sophia crossed the room slowly, aware of every step, of the way she was watching without seeming to. "I'm not asking you to forgive me," Sophia said. "I'm asking you to listen."

For a heartbeat the careful distance between them thinned to nothing at all. The conversation turned, the way conversations do, from the easy things to the ones that mattered. "You shouldn't have come," she said, and the words landed softer than they were meant to.

She remembered the first time, and the last, and all the ordinary days in between that had somehow mattered more. "I'm not asking you to forgive me," Sophia said. "I'm asking you to listen."

There are moments that divide a life into before and after. This was becoming one of them.

She remembered the first time, and the last, and all the ordinary days in between that had somehow mattered more. For a heartbeat the careful distance between them thinned to nothing at all. Sophia crossed the room slowly, aware of every step, of the way she was watching without seeming to.

She did not sleep that night. There was too much to lose, and far too much to want.