Sarah burst through my office door like a hurricane in heels, tablet clutched against her chest, eyes bright with scandal.
"And you kept quiet that your husband's being nominated for Breakthrough Talent of the Year?"
The accusation hung between us while I continued typing, fingers steady on the keyboard despite the interruption. Breakthrough Talent of the Year—what a ridiculous, manufactured accolade. Has anyone even heard of it outside the incestuous art world circle-jerk?
If Andrew hadn't mentioned it, it couldn't matter much. Still, warmth spread through my chest—pride, unexpected and unwelcome.
His exhibition had toured half of America, every painting sold to collectors who'd fight over his next pieces. Everything except the one now buried in our storage closet, wrapped in black plastic like evidence of a crime.
That painting—Hannah and me tangled in his fantasy—Andrew had torn it from our living room wall himself the day we learned Hannah had killed Olivia. His hands shook as he wrapped it, muttering something about not being able to look at it anymore.
"Angie, are you even listening?" Sarah's voice cut through my thoughts.
"I'm working, Sarah. Some of us have actual business to conduct."
"Oh God." Her face went pale, the tablet trembling in her grip. "Angie—the verdict in Hannah's case."
My fingers stilled on the keyboard. The office suddenly felt airless, walls pressing closer. "Don't drag it out. What is it?"
Sarah's eyes widened, pupils dilated with the thrill of delivering news. "She was acquitted. The jury found her not guilty."
The words crashed over me like cold water. Not guilty. Hannah Rogers, who'd driven a knife into Olivia Campbell's chest—free.
Justice. The word tasted strange, foreign on my tongue, but that's what flooded through me. Not fear, not anger—justice.
Hannah didn't deserve prison, even if every ethical framework would paint her as the villain.
She'd already destroyed her life thoroughly enough. Now she'd have a chance to rebuild somewhere else—if she got help. Real help, not the performative therapy I'd suggested in that prison visiting room.
Because I'd finally done it myself. Gotten help.
"Clear my afternoon," I told Sarah, who still hovered in the doorway like she expected more reaction.
"But you have the Bowman review at three—"
"Clear it."
She left, confused but obedient. I grabbed my coat and headed for the elevator.
Dr. Gianna Freeman's office occupied the top floor of a brownstone that whispered old money and discretion. Miriam had recommended her—"She's brilliant, darling, and more importantly, she's seen everything. Nothing you say will shock her."
I'd been seeing her for six weeks now, twice weekly sessions where I vomited up every manipulative game, every calculated cruelty, every moment I'd played with Hannah's desperation like a cat with a wounded mouse.
"You're early," Dr. Freeman observed as I settled into the leather chair across from her. Mid-fifties, silver hair swept into an elegant chignon, she radiated the kind of calm that came from hearing humanity's worst confessions without flinching.
"Hannah was acquitted."
"How do you feel about that?"
"Relieved." The admission surprised me. "She's been punished enough. We all have."
"Have you?" Dr. Freeman's pen moved across her notepad in smooth strokes. "Last session we were discussing your encounter with Julian Kestrel."
Heat crawled up my neck. We'd been dissecting that particular failure for two sessions now—my weakness, my hypocrisy, the way I'd let Julian fuck me in that gallery workroom while Andrew celebrated feet away.
"You said it was an aftershock from a panic attack," Dr. Freeman continued, her tone neutral as Switzerland. "Triggered by seeing Andrew with Hannah."
"That's what it was." The defensive edge in my voice betrayed me. "I was vulnerable. He was there. It happened."
"And what did you truly feel when you decided to sleep with Julian?"
I turned to the window, watching Manhattan pulse below.
Memory flooded back—Julian's hand at my hip, possessive but not cruel. The other at my throat, pressure without violence. The way he'd pushed into me faster and faster, taking control I'd surrendered willingly.
Desire flickered low in my belly, unwanted but undeniable.
"I felt—"
I turned back to meet her steady gaze.
"He was the kind you don't have to control. The kind who controls himself. I wanted that. To let go of control. To let go of everything."
"Did it work?"
"Absolutely." The truth tasted like copper on my tongue. "And even though I told myself it was a one-time mistake, I'll admit—I would do it again."
Dr. Freeman considered me for a long moment, pen still, eyes thoughtful.
"You don't need to abolish control, Angie. You need to learn to release it by choice." She leaned forward slightly, her voice taking on a gentle urgency. "Mastery isn't gripping tighter; it's knowing when to loosen your hand."
"Easy to say."
"If you want to practice that safely, Andrew may be exactly the person to help you." She held up a hand before I could protest. "Not because he dominates you, but because he loves you enough to hold the space while you stop holding everything."
"Andrew?" I laughed, the sound bitter. "Andrew, who needed two women to feel like a man? Who painted his fantasies instead of living them until I forced his hand?"
"Andrew who stayed after learning about the money you paid Hannah. Who held you in that parking garage after everything fell apart. Who took down that painting himself because he couldn't bear what it represented anymore."
The words landed like stones in still water, ripples spreading through my carefully constructed defenses.
"He's different now," Dr. Freeman continued. "The question is whether you can be different too. Whether you can trust him enough to let go, even for moments."
"I held a knife to his throat."
"And he gave it to you willingly." She smiled slightly. "That's either the ultimate dysfunction or the deepest trust. Perhaps both."
The session ended with her usual prescription—think about it, consider it, don't act impulsively. But as I walked back to my car, her words echoed: He loves you enough to hold the space while you stop holding everything.
That night, I found Andrew in his studio, working on something new. Not bodies—at least not visibly. The easel was angled away, a drop cloth tented the side of the canvas, and he’d dragged a rolling rack between us like a modesty screen.
He never shows unfinished work; even with me here, he kept painting, brush moving in careful, staccato strokes I could hear but not see.
“Sarah told me about the nomination,” I said from the doorway.
He didn’t turn. “It’s nothing. Marketing bullshit.”
“It’s something.” I stepped closer but kept my eyes on him, not the canvas. “You’ve earned recognition.”
“Have I?” The brush paused midair. “For pieces born of our worst moments? For making art from Hannah’s destruction?”
“For surviving it,” I said. I set my hand on his shoulder; the muscle there was coiled wire. “For choosing to stay.”
He set the brush down on the cart without swiveling the easel, then reached back, paint-stained fingers finding mine and tugging me within his orbit. “I still dream about her,” he admitted. “Not sexually. Just… there. In that visiting room. That laugh.”
“It’s okay.”
His face shifted—blank, then processing, then something like weariness washing out of him. He let my hand go only to dip the brush again, the soft tap against the palette a metronome between us.
“Dr. Freeman thinks I need to learn to let go of control,” I said, surprising myself with the confession in this room of secrets.
His eyebrows lifted, though he still didn’t turn the canvas. “Your therapist clearly hasn’t met you.”
“She thinks you could help,” I went on. “Hold space for me to… stop holding everything.”
For a heartbeat, the room stilled. Then something in his expression softened, warmed, edged toward dangerous. “Is that what you want?”
The question hung between us, heavy with possibility. I promised myself I’d think about it—tomorrow, next week, when the world felt less honed, less likely to cut. Behind the rack, bristles whispered over linen; he resumed painting without offering a glimpse, and I kept my promise not to look.
His hand found mine again, squeezed once—steady, certain. And I understood: some answers don’t live on the surface of a canvas.
I pulled a stool beside him and sat, eyes on his profile, not the work. For once, I let the unfinished stay unseen and the night unforced, and in that deliberate not-looking, something inside me finally loosened.