Part 2 — The Lie He Filed With The Police
Dawn came to Manhattan like a blade.
The windows turned silver first, then pale blue, then bright enough to make the city below look expensive and unforgiving. Cars moved between buildings like blood through veins. Somewhere beneath us, millions of people were beginning ordinary days.
Mine no longer knew what ordinary meant.
I slept maybe three hours.
Nicholas Bellini did not sleep at all.
When I entered the kitchen, he was standing over the stove making eggs with the grim expression of a man performing a task because human bodies required maintenance.
His white shirt sleeves were rolled to his elbows. His tie was gone. His phone sat beside the coffee machine, lighting up every few seconds.
“You need to eat,” he said.
Not good morning.
Not are you okay.
You need to eat.
For some reason, that almost made me cry.
Ryan used to tell me when to eat too.
But with Ryan, it was control.
You ate too much.
You barely ate anything today; are you trying to make me feel guilty?
Don’t order that. You always get bloated.
With Nicholas, it was different.
Blunt.
Practical.
No performance.
He placed a plate in front of me and poured coffee into a white ceramic mug.
Then he stayed across the island, maintaining distance like a rule he had set for himself.
“We need to establish protocols,” he said.
I looked down at the eggs.
“Protocols.”
“Yes.”
“You really talk like this?”
“Yes.”
I almost smiled.
Almost.
