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“Fine. How’s yours?” Victoria asked, hugging her sister and then pulling out of it quickly. “Palmer?”

“Yes, she texted me. I responded.”

“Was it dirty?” Victoria asked, lifting a devilish eyebrow at her.

“What? No,” she replied, laughing.

“No dirty texts? What’s the point?” Victoria flopped onto the sofa.

“What’s the point? I don’t know; it’s nice to just talk to her sometimes.”

“Because she’s your girlfriend?” Victoria asked in a singsong, teasing voice.

Elizabeth sat down next to her and said, “We haven’t used that term, specifically.”

“Specifically? What have you saidgenerally, then, Lizzy?”

Elizabeth smiled and replied, “That we love each other.”

“Holy shit! You told her?”

Elizabeth laughed and confirmed, “Yes, I told her.”

“And she said it back? Or did she say it first?”

“No,Isaid it first. She said it back, though.”

“Thank God. It was so obvious.”

“Itwasnot.”

“Lizzy, I’ve known you my whole life. I’ve seen you in the only other relationship you’ve ever been in. I know what it looks like when you’re in love with someone.”

Elizabeth lowered her gaze to her hands in her lap.

“I’ve been thinking about her a lot lately.”

“Well, yeah, you love her.”

“No, I meant Teagan. I’ve been thinking about Teagan a lot.”

“What kind of thoughts have you been having?”

“They’re kind of all over the place. I have a lot of anger toward her that I don’t know I’ll ever resolve now. She asked Alex for a divorce because she wanted to break up with me.”

“Shesaidbreak up?”

“No, but that was what she meant. She wanted to date other women, and divorcing Alex would have meant she was free from him and from me.”

“I get why you’d be angry with her. That whole stupid marriage thing was supposed to help all three of you.”

“Dad would have gone through the roof when he found out they’d only gotten married to hide Alex and I.”

“Probably.” Victoria shrugged a shoulder.

“But it’s also just this intense amount of guilt that I’ve been feeling,” Elizabeth added.

“I feel that, too,” Victoria admitted honestly. “We were supposed to be killed, too. If that security guard hadn’t stopped them at that airport, their plan would have killed us, Lizzy.”