Page 164 of The Clinch
Thanks, Lukas. I’m good
The dots appear,vanish, appear again.
LUKAS
You sure?
LIZ
Yes
I lockmy phone and start walking toward the subway. Fast.
My heart is beating too hard for what’s actually happened, and I know that. Leo did not lock me in a room. He arranged rides. He put people in motion. He made my life easier.
That’s exactly the problem.
I can already hear the explanation he would give me, calm and reasonable enough to make me doubt myself for wanting air.
No.
When I get on the train, the anger turns cold. What’s left is worse than anger.
Resolve.
I’m not doing this.
By the timeI reach the apartment, I’m done negotiating with myself.
Leo is in the living room, an arm braced along the back of the sofa, still in training sweats, reading a book. The second he sees me, his expression sharpens.
“What happened?”
There it is. Immediate triage. Immediate focus. Immediate reach for the broken thing he can fix if I give him enough information.
It lands wrong so fast, I could choke on it.
“I need to talk to you.”
He straightens slowly, watching me.
The apartment is quiet. Late light across the floor. The expensive stillness of a place I have been sleeping in, dressing in, leaving from every morning. A place that has started to feel so easy to step into that somewhere along the way I stopped noticing how much of my life had folded itself inside it.
For one sharp second, that nearly guts me.
Then I remember.
Leo stands and takes a step toward me. “Liz.”
“Lukas texted me.”
He doesn’t interrupt. “All right.”
“No.” My voice comes out flatter than I expect. “Not all right.”
Then, calm and careful, “Tell me.”
I laugh once. It sounds thin in the quiet. He absorbs it without trying to soften the blow.
