My voice booms. “Tell me you didn’t do this!”

She looks me right in the eye, chin raised, eyes simmering. “I didn’t do this.”

But then, when I don’t say anything, her face falls like a collapsing castle of cards. “You don’t believe me.”

I look away. “Put yourself in my place.”

“I’m trying to.” Her lip trembles. “But I would believe you, so I can’t.” She shakes her head. “When have I ever given you a reason to think I want money out of this?”

“Maybe you weren’t after money…in the beginning,” Winston interjects, like a barrister setting up a question during a trial. “But then you came here and saw firsthand the wealth that was to be had. Perhaps with your departure so close, you made the choice to get what you could while you could.”

“Shut your mouth!” Olivia lunges at him.

But I grab her arm, pulling her back. “That’s enough.”

Our eyes meet, hers so big and begging. Begging for me to believe her. And, Christ, I want to. But uncertainty twists my heart around in my chest, making it hard to breathe.

“I’ll call my father,” Olivia declares. “He’ll tell you it’s a mistake.”

She slides her phone out of her pocket, dials and waits. After what seems like fucking forever, she looks up at me, nervously. “There’s no answer. I’ll keep trying.”

While she redials, I ask Winston, “Where did the money come from?”

“We haven’t been able to trace the transfer yet; we’re working on it.”

My voice is strong—commanding. “I need that information, Winston. It’s the only way to know for sure.”

Slowly, Olivia lowers the phone from her ear. And she looks at me, staring, like I’m a stranger. No—worse—like I’m a monster.

“After everything that’s happened, everything I’m willing to give up for you, everything we’ve said and been to each other for the last five months…you need more information until you can decide if I’m the type of person who would take one of the most painful secrets of your life and sell it to a supermarket rag?”

There’s a warning voice that tells me to stop. All of this. Right here, right now—go no farther. It says I have no reason not to trust her. That she could never do this to me. Not the Olivia I know.

But I turn deaf ears on that voice. Because it lies. I’ve listened to it before—over and over again when I was young and stupid and wrong.

I won’t be wrong again. Not about this—not about her. It would…break me.

My face feels like a mask—stone cold and blank.

“Yes. I need more information.”

And she shatters, like a windowpane that’s been struck by a fist, right in front of me.

“Fuck you!” She steps back, yelling and crying and shaking her head. “Fuck you and this fucked-up place that raised you. You’re so messed up. You’re so warped inside—because of these games and these people. You can’t even see it. And I can’t stand to look at you right now.”

“Then leave!” I shout back. “There’s the door—get out! If I’m so hard to look at, go back to fucking New York!”

The second the words leave my mouth I want to snatch them back. I don’t mean them. But words don’t work that way. Once heard, they can’t ever be taken back.

All they can do is echo.

The color drains from Olivia’s cheeks and her eyes close. Her face turns toward the floor and her shoulders drop. Like she’s…done. Like there’s nothing left to her at all.

She takes a shuddering breath and without raising her head, without looking at me even one more time, she turns and walks out.

For a full minute, no one speaks. I stand there—like an idiot—staring at the space where she just stood.

Henry’s words fill the silence. “You’re making a mistake. And that was harsh, Nicholas, even for you.”

I face Winston. “Find out where the money came from. Now.”

Winston bows and leaves.

I feel Henry’s eyes on the back of my head, but I don’t turn around. I have nothing to say.

He doesn’t feel the same.

“Hello?” He comes around and tries to knock on my head. “Is anyone alive in there? Who are you right now?”

He seems different to me somehow, taller or older. More…serious. I don’t know why I didn’t notice before, or why the hell I’m seeing it now.

“What are you going on about?”

“Well, you look like my brother and you sound like him, but you’re not him. You’re some alternate version of him—the one who gives all those scripted, meaningless answers in interviews. The Tin Man.”

“I’m not in the mood to play games with you, Henry.”

He goes on like I haven’t spoken at all.

“My real brother would know that Olivia wouldn’t, couldn’t, do this. He’d know it in here.” He pokes my chest. “So either you’re too afraid to trust your own instincts or you’re too afraid to trust her, but either way, you just let the best damn thing that’s ever happened to you walk right out the door. And with the lives we have, that’s really saying something.”

I swallow hard, feeling cold and numb inside. Feeling…nothing.

My voice is as hollow as my chest. “If she didn’t do it, it’s one hell of a coincidence. I’ll know what to do once Winston gets more information.”