“I don’t need this headache,” Evan muttered. He tucked a twenty-dollar bill under his plate. “It is what it is, okay? You and I have a business arrangement. If I’m not mistaken, it’s worked out pretty well. For both of us. You don’t want to throw that away, Letty. Think about it, okay? In the meantime, Tanya’s moving in with me. I’ll send somebody over to pick up her stuff.”

He slid out of his side of the booth, brushing toast crumbs from the front of his immaculately pressed white dress shirt, then glanced at his wristwatch.

“Don’t forget, you’ve got a walk-through at the new unit in SoHo at three today. And you need to meet the guys delivering the furniture at noon.”

“I’ll be there,” she said, her tone as detached and businesslike as his. “Please tell my sister I expect her to have the clothes she borrowed dry-cleaned and returned to me by this weekend.”

Letty found a tiny, windowless studio apartment in Brooklyn. Ronnie Silver never formally fired her as a client, but the acting jobs dried up as she began to distance herself from Evan and Tanya.

She told herself it was a blessing in disguise and threw herself into her new job, working for a rental agent at a big midtown real estate company.

Tanya showed up at the door of the Tribeca apartment the day Letty was moving out, a bag of dry cleaning in one hand and an expensive bottle of champagne in the other.

“How’d you get up here?” Letty said coldly, not bothering to invite her sister inside.

“Sidney let me up,” Tanya said.

“Oh that’s right. I forgot. My doorman has a crush on you too.”

Her little sister had the grace to blush. “Come on, Letty, please don’t be mad at me. I didn’t deliberately set out to hook up with Evan. It just happened. Neither of us understands why you insist on quitting and moving out. I wish you wouldn’t be so damned stubborn.”

“I made a mistake,” Letty said. “Well, lots of mistakes, but the biggest one was getting mixed up with Evan Wingfield. I know you probably won’t listen, but believe me, Tanya, you don’t know what you’re getting into. This guy is bad news.”

“No,” Tanya said, shaking her head. “You don’t know the real Evan. He puts on this tough-guy act, but that’s all just a show. If you got to know him like I have, you’d see, he’s this incredibly tender, vulnerable man.” She thrust the champagne bottle at Letty. “Aren’t you even going to invite me inside?”

Letty opened the door wider and gestured at the stacks of boxes in the living room. “I really don’t have time for this today. The movers will be here in another hour.”