So there we were, beneath the white lights, with the milk and the pearls and the sleeping baby, and Weston at the height of his performance.
“Still pretending you know something?” he said, when I only smiled.
“Really?” I said again.
It was the only word I trusted myself to use, because it was the only word small enough to hide everything behind.
Two minutes later, Dr.
Xavier Aldridge stepped out of the elevator in a dark suit, a sealed hospital envelope in his hand.
He’d been finishing his own day; I hadn’t summoned him for theater.
But Delphine saw him first, and she understood before Weston did — because Delphine, unlike her partner, had always been the one who watched the exits.
The baby bottle slipped from her fingers and struck the floor, and milk spread in a slow white fan across the polished tile.
“What’s wrong with you?” Weston said to her.