Page 94 of Healed

“My kitchen, my rules, Nicole.”

“It’s Emma.”

“Eh, I had a fifty-fifty shot,” she shrugged.

Then she placed her chin on the palm of her hand and looked at me expectantly. “Well?”

I was barely able to meet her eyes, either.

Not just because of where my thoughts had been, but also because of what I had witnessed between her and Dante last night.

“Nothing interesting,” I muttered back, looking down and staring at my cup of tea.

“Uh huh,” she said. “I believe that as much as I believe the sky is nuclear green.”

“Rachel, we’re off out,” Heather called from the doorway, shrugging Axel into his coat.

Rachel was out of her seat in a second, crouching down low in front of her son.

“Are you going out with Heather today?” she beamed up, pulling up his zipper.

“Hepper,” Axel mimicked back.

“You be a good boy today, you hear?” she said, and every word she spoke was accompanied by sign language, which I knew was for Bee’s benefit.

“Have you got your tablet?” she asked Bee, who was standing slightly behind Heather.

“Yes, Mummy,” I heard her reply—but only just. Her voice was a barely-there whisper.

“Liam is going to ride with you,” Dante informed Heather, his voice telling her that there was no room for arguing.

But Heather bristled and argued anyway.

“I don’t need a guard, Dante,” she said, as though she were insulted at the thought.

“Be grateful I’m even letting you out,” Dante snapped back. “Especially with my kids.”

“You’re not even letting us out of the village!”

“It’s out of the compound, isn’t it? You take Bee to school, Axel to get ice cream, and then you’re right back here. It shouldn’t take more than an hour.”

“This place feels more like a prison every single day.”

“Do you want to be unemployed?” Dante said.

Heather wisely kept her mouth shut after that.

“Right. Well,” Rachel said, standing up and clapping her hands. “That’s made things sufficiently awkward for just about everyone involved. You get going, Heather. Call me from the car. And call me again once you’ve dropped Bee off.”

“Rachel, we’ve done this journey—”

“A million times, I know, I know. But for my peace of mind, Heather.”

“Fine,” she relented, rolling her eyes.

“I’m busy in the office today, Gabby,” Rachel told me as Heather left. “We have a surprise inspection from the taxman, so I’m just making sure everything is in order.”

“Surprise inspection?” I asked.