“Do I need to tell you not to mention the birth control to your husband?”

I shake my head.

“Good. Remember, Holton. I want to know anyone he talks to.”

28

Santiago

My eyes blur in and out of focus as I try in vain to study the monitors in my office. A constant stream of numbers inundates me. Patterns emerge. Money ebbs and flows. This is the one sanctuary I have in life. The one area I know without a doubt I can find solace. Yet it seems to evade me this past twenty-four hours.

I have spent all day holed up in this room, trying not to think about my wife and what she might be doing. Antonia has entered several times to offer me anything my black heart might desire, but her menus for the day lack the sustenance I truly crave.

I reach for the bottle of scotch, twisting the cap in my hand before I think better of it. This restless energy building up inside me is unfamiliar. I don't recognize it, and I don't know what to do with it.

"Fuck!" I growl, swiping my hand across the desk and scattering the contents around the room.

The scotch bottle shatters on the floor, and papers rain down like my fragmented thoughts. I am tempted to call Antonia back for yet another report on the current status of my wife. But I fear even she is exhausted with my constant requests for information, which so far have proven fruitless.

She tells me what she thinks I want to hear. Ivy has eaten. She has showered and dressed. She has rested. But those aren't the details I need, and in my exasperation, I find I don't know how to express what I need because I can't even identify it myself.

"Feel better?" Mercedes enters the room, eyeing the evidence of my tantrum with an arched brow, her red heels crunching over the broken glass littering the floor.

"What do you want?" I snap.

She flinches at my tone but recovers quickly as she often does, squaring her shoulders and crossing her arms as she pins me with her gaze.

"What is the matter with you?" she demands. "You've been sulking around in here all day. It isn't like you."

"I'm busy," I answer shortly. "It's a concept you might understand if you had any other motivation in life besides devouring the souls of the innocent."

A dry laugh erupts from her lips as she shakes her head in disbelief. "Really, brother? You of all people are going to lecture me on morality?"

I don't know why I'm being such an asshole to her. But it can't be helped, and I'm not in the mood for a confrontation with her, which is exactly what she came here for.