“You noticed that faster than you noticed your lies catching up with you.”

His mouth tightened. “You have no idea what you’ve done. Hospitals are complicated. Surgery is complicated. People die, Claire. Careers are ruined because outsiders want simple villains.”

“Lily Monroe was not an outsider.”

“She was unstable.”

The word came too easily. I looked at him then — really looked — and wondered how many women he’d reduced with that word whenever they challenged him.

Unstable. Emotional. Difficult. Confused. Words used like scalpels, leaving no visible blood.