Page 29 of Devotion
I turned toward the house, tossed my ruined shirt over a chair, and stood in the dark kitchen for a minute. The house was quiet. Just me and the silence and the lingering scent of her that I could still smell on my hands from where she’d helped me out of the lounge.
Here’s the thing about being an actor. You learn to watch. To study people. To notice the way they move and speak and breathe, the tells they don’t know they have, the moments where the mask slips and something real comes through.
Miley Torres had no mask. Every emotion she felt traveled across her face in real time, unfiltered, every flicker readable. She blushed when I complimented her. She stammered when I got close. She remembered details from interviews I’d forgotten giving and was embarrassed about it instead of leveraging it.
She was genuine enough to make me suspicious, because in my experience, genuine people were either naive or running a very long con.
But she’d also pinned a photographer’s wrist to a table without hesitation. She’d driven a stranger’s car through Miami at night without complaint. She’d carried an EpiPen in her bag and used it to save my life without thinking twice.
Naive people didn’t do that. Con artists didn’t carry EpiPens.
I poured a glass of water, drank it slowly.
Then I smiled.
She was definitely more interesting than I’d given her credit for.
I hadn’t been drunk tonight. Not even close. Two bourbons over two hours was nothing. I’d been perfectly lucid the entire time, from the moment Adrianna threw her drink to the moment Miley helped me into the car. But the woman who drove me home didn’t even listen to my explanation.
My phone buzzed on the counter. I glanced at it.
A message from Trisha.
TRISHA
Where the hell have you been? You’re going to be the death of me!
CHAPTER 8
Miley
Eloise was wearing a crown made of construction paper and glitter when I walked through Vicky’s front door. She’d made it herself. I could tell because it was lopsided, covered in yellow marker, and had a sticker of a unicorn on the front that was peeling at the edges. She looked up from the living room floor where she was hosting a tea party for three stuffed animals and a plastic dinosaur, and her whole face lit up.
“AUNTIE MILEY!”
She launched herself at me with everything she had—arms out, full-tilt, no hesitation. I caught her, swung her up, and buried my face in her hair, which smelled like strawberry shampoo and the particular sweetness that only children carry. The sweetness always made my chest ache because she didn't know yet how hard the world was going to try to take it from her.
“Did you bring cake?” she asked, pulling back to study my face like a tiny detective on the case.
“I brought something better.”
“Better than cake?”
“Empanadas.”
Her eyes went wide. “The ones with the cheese?”
“The ones with the cheese.”
She wriggled out of my arms and ran to the kitchen, and I followed her into Vicky’s apartment, which was small, clean, and held together by willpower. It was the organizational skill that only single mothers could develop. Every surface served a purpose. The couch had throw pillows that hid the broken spring. The fridge had Eloise’s drawings held up by magnets shaped like fruit. The dining table doubled as a homework station, a bill-paying desk, and based on the crayon marks, a princess art studio.
Vicky was in the kitchen. She looked bone-deep tired, the eleven months of grief sitting on her shoulders. But she smiled when she saw me, and the smile was real. She hugged me the way she always did, tight and with her chin on my shoulder.
“You look better,” she said.
“You look like you need to sit down.”
“I’ve been sitting. Eloise had me playing tea party for two hours. I was the guest of honor. She made me wear a tiara.”
