My phone buzzes in my hand.
Emerson: I’ll send the police to check.
Daphne: Do NOT do that. My brother would freak out.
Emerson: Which brother?
I blink at the phone. Read it again. Cold awareness fights to get through the champagne drunk, but it can’t quite make it. He knows I have more than one brother. He knows.
Daphne: Did you look me up on Facebook?
Three little dots float on the screen. I peek over my shoulder to make sure he’s not watching through the window. That’s silly. He couldn’t get into Leo’s courtyard. There’s no way he’s watching me right now.
Emerson: Of course not, little painter.
It doesn’t make me feel any better.
He’s typing again.
Emerson: I don’t need social media. I have a complete dossier on you.
Noise beats at my ears, so loud I think something’s gone wrong with the music. It’s not the music. It’s my heart.
Emerson: I know your birthday
Emerson: Your social security number
Emerson: The tax ID number of the dummy corporation your father made to funnel money through when you were four years old
No, I type out. I don’t get a chance to send it.
Emerson: I know what you think about at night.
I move my thumb over the button to block his number. To stop him from saying any of these things to me. To stop him from scaring the shit out of me. I could walk across the room right now and put my phone in Leo’s hand. I wouldn’t have to say anything out loud. It would be over. This insane, intense obsession—it would be done.
Daphne: Do you?
“Come dance,” Eva calls.
“I’ll be right there.”
No new dots appear on the screen. I hold my breath. He makes me wait so long I have to let it out again. I have to keep breathing. Keep feeling the hairs pulled tight at the back of my neck.
The next text to arrive has no words. It’s a picture. I curl my hand over the screen to hide it, but there’s nothing illicit. It’s the ocean at night. My breath catches. The nose of a surfboard pokes into the bottom edge of the frame.
I painted this. I didn’t have a reference photo. He could be out there right now, frozen to the bone, diving into black water.
Daphne: That’s not what I think about
I’m lying. I think about him on his surfboard all the time.
Eva can’t tolerate this another second longer and she drags me back out to the dance floor. I’ve lost my champagne. She hands me another one. No one cares that I have my phone in my hand. I take pictures of the party so someone will remember it later. Leo and Haley are like two stars in orbit around one another. The later it gets, the more she laughs. He laughs with her. But there’s something else in his eyes. Sadness, I think.
Another text.
Another picture.
A painting, hung on the wall of a house. A man’s shadow over it. It’s the painting I made for him. It’s Emerson’s shadow. It strikes me as unbelievably dirty, his shadow over my art like that. He owns it. It’s his now. That painting is his little prisoner.
Daphne: Not that either…
This time, only a few minutes pass.
A third picture.
If Lucian noticed all the texting right now, I could truthfully say that it is another picture of the ocean. But this time, the ocean is viewed through a window.
A bedroom window.
I know instantly that this is Emerson’s bed. Neatly made up. It’s practically an invitation to destroy it.
Daphne: I think of your eyes in the art gallery
Emerson: When I kissed you?
Daphne: When you were watching me
Emerson: You liked it
Daphne: No, I didn’t
Eva drags me to the dessert table and forces me to eat more cake. Leo and Haley follow, and Cash, and then Elaine and Lucian and somehow it escalates into plans for a personalized bouquet to be sent to the bakery. It’s a perfect cake.
“You made the right call.” Eva grabs my hand and looks deeply into my eyes. “I want you to know that.”
My spine freezes. I’m drunk. Does she mean Emerson? “About what?”
“The gold and white,” she says. Oh my god. The party decorations. “It’s better than what I was picturing.”
She wants to dance, so we dance.
Emerson: Tell the truth, little painter. Pretend I’m one of your canvases. I want to know what you need.
Daphne: I can’t tell you that
Emerson: You can tell me anything.
I can’t tell him anything. That’s dangerous. It’s dangerous for anyone, but especially for me. You have to really be able to trust a person to tell them everything. Leo and Haley have stopped dancing. They stand still in the middle of everything, his hands on her face, his eyes on hers. I can’t hear a word of what he’s saying. He trusts her with everything.
Daphne: What do you think about at night?
No answer.
No dots on the phone.
My eyes burn with how late it is, and how drunk I am. Leo shoos Lucian and Elaine into a car, which they barely see because they’re too busy making out with each other. He helps Eva into a second one and stands there with the door open, talking to her for several minutes too long.
“I’m going to bed.” I pull Haley in for a hug. “Happy birthday.”
“Thank you.” She squeezes me tight. “I’m so happy you were here. I really mean it. I loved it.”
It makes my heart hurt. It makes me laugh. “I’ll come to all your parties. But right now I have to go to sleep. I think I’ll die if I don’t.”
“Me too.” Haley laughs and lets me go. Her face is pink and her eyes are bright, and I’m happy for her. After everything, she deserves this. “Night, Daphne.”
I’m almost up the stairs when Leo comes into the foyer and picks her up in his arms. He makes it look easy. Like it doesn’t matter if he got shot, it doesn’t matter if he was sick. He won’t let it show. She drops her head onto his shoulder.
Am I jealous? Maybe.
In the tower suite I toss my phone on the pillow and go to wash my face. Pins out of my hair. Dress off. Party’s over. Time for a tank top and lounge pants. Time to get under the covers and dream of a man I shouldn’t want. I’m not interested in over-the-top obsession like that. I want what Leo and Haley have.
I’m two steps from the bed when my phone lights up.
I freeze in place, goose bumps rising on the back of my neck. It’s a coincidence. He’s not watching.
On tiptoe, I approach the side of the bed and lean over to see the message.
It’s from Emerson.
All it says is:
You.
Chapter Sixteen
Daphne
Everything falls apart.
That’s how it goes, doesn’t it? For one shining evening, everything is warm and good and right. And then it crashes to the ground.
A few days after Haley’s birthday party, I come downstairs and Leo tells me she’s gone. Which is impossible. He loves her. He’s in love with her. He won’t give me any details, so I go to Gerard, who says Leo sent her away. Something to do with her father being sick. With the Constantines.
It never stops with them. It makes me sick. I always thought the feud between our families was like the cliques at school. An easy way to belong, never with any teeth. But then—people got bullied out of school, didn’t they? Not everyone had an older brother waiting in the wings to scare the shit out of anyone who tried anything with me. Not everyone was safe. Leo wasn’t safe. I just thought he was.