Page 147 of Without a Trace
She moved slower than usual. Sleep still clinging to her limbs. She walked past me, half-dazed, toward the bathroom. The tank top hitched higher with each step. Her underwear was black. Thin. My hands curled at my sides.
She didn’t turn around. “Stop watching me like that.”
“You don’t even know how I’m watching you.”
“Yes I do,” she said, voice scratchy. “Because it’s the same way I used to watch you.”
I stood there another few seconds, staring at the place she’d just been, wondering how the hell we were supposed to sit down at a table and pretend like everything hadn’t changed.
Because it had.
And I couldn’t lose her now.
She stood at the open closet, one hand on the doorframe, the other rifling through fabrics like none of it mattered.
“Help me pick,” she said over her shoulder. “I’m not in the mood to decide.”
My body moved before my brain caught up. Of course I was going to help her. I’d help her tear the whole place down if she asked.
She tossed a few dresses across the bed—red, white, black. Each one deadlier than the last.
Red meant blood. It clung, it stained. That dress was destruction wrapped in silk.
I brushed my fingers over it. “You wear this when you want someone to bleed and thank you for it.”
Her shoulder lifted half an inch. No reaction. She was already halfway through choosing another.
The white one looked soft. Dangerous in a different way. It was short. Innocent. A lie.
“This one’s for when you pretend it wasn’t on purpose,” I muttered. “The aftermath dress.”
She didn’t answer.
Then there was the black.
She didn’t need my words to know what it meant.
Still, I said it. “This is the one you wear when you want to end them.”
Scarlett turned, dress in hand. That same one—satin, fitted, cut low enough to weaponize.
“I’ll wear the black.”
Of course she would.
She held it like she was choosing armor, not an outfit. Like this wasn’t just dinner. Like she knew something I didn’t, and this was her warning shot.
She didn’t wait for me. Walked toward the bathroom, hip brushing mine as she passed. My hand flexed at my side.
If I reached for her now, there’d be no walking away.
But she was already slipping out of her sleep shirt, letting it pool on the floor without looking back.
So I turned. Sat on the edge of the bed. Palms flat.
She was mine. Ours. But the world wasn’t going to let her go without a fight.
And judging by the dress she’d just chosen, she wasn’t planning to leave quietly.
