Page 57 of Impulse Control
The apartment smelled faintly of flowers. That was new.
I did a quick sweep of the apartment as I crossed the living room, eyes skimming out of habit more than concern. My backup camera was on the charger. Contact sheets stacked where I’d left them. Prints lining the walls in their familiar, imperfect order.
Everything was where it should be. Even my Kindle which was waiting on the coffee table. I’d made myself leave it there and go to bed despite the excellent book sucking me in. I was such a mood reader these days, I’d started and stopped four different books this week before I landed on the one Frankie said Ihadto read. So I’d given it a chance.
It was calledQueen of Carnage, and no lie, the title hooked me before I even hit the first page. A good book was the bane of all sleep and I was looking forward to finishing it tonight. I wasalso not sure if I was happy about how many were in the series—gonna be a lot of sleepless nights ahead—or frustrated because I was going to have to exercise alotof self-control.
Giving myself another little shake, I reached for the door and pulled it open?—
—and nearly walked straight into the bouquet sitting neatly on the mat outside my apartment.
I stopped short.
The flowers were wrapped in brown paper and tied with twine, deliberate and unflashy, like someone had taken the time to let the flowers show off, not the presentation. White ranunculus, clean and soft, with something green and trailing I didn’t try to identify. They were pretty. That was enough. Rain had speckled the paper lightly, darkening it at the edges.
There was a card tucked into the twine.
Knock them dead today.—D
I smiled before I could stop myself.
A second note was taped to the card, written in a looser hand.
They came stupid early. I was up. Enjoy.—Alix
That made me laugh out loud.
It settled something in my chest I hadn’t realized was tight. Dominic’s timing. Alix’s thoughtfulness. The quiet reassurance that people knew where I was and had my back—even from different directions.
I ducked back into the apartment, trimmed the stems with the dull kitchen scissors, and put them in a vase on the windowsill where the light—what little there was—could find them. It put me about eight minutes late on leaving than I’d wanted, butworthit. The flowers and the notes both buoyed me in all the right ways.
Blowing a kiss to Dominic that he couldn’t see or feel, I doubled back to the door and continued with my rush. Today was already packed.
Paris Daily was already humming when I arrived, the rain doing nothing to slow it down. I shrugged out of my coat, dropped my bag at my desk, and pulled up the files from the day before.
Four images.
Mischa Condre’s first class required each of us to present four photographs—no explanation beyondbring work that tells me how you see. No warm-up. No easing in.
I’d selected them the night before, then changed my mind. Twice.
Now, with the clock ticking louder in my head, doubt crept back in.
Too similar. Too safe. Too much like René would approve and not enough like me. I wanted this to be my work. I’d already pulled the images from yesterday’s shoots for René and sent them over via email.
“Early,” Margaux said, appearing at the edge of my desk with a coffee in hand. She glanced at my screen. “Or is that just your normal now?”
“Temporary insanity,” I said. “I need four.”
She leaned in without asking, scanning the thumbnails quickly. “For class?”
I nodded.
“These,” she said immediately, pointing. “And that one. Not the green one—the other.”
I hesitated. “That’s risky.”
“Of course it is,” Margaux said with an easy smile. “That’s why it is a good choice.”
