“But now I’ve lost my concentration.” He paused. “I really am sorry,” he continued softly. “I might be messed up, but I shouldn’t have taken it out on you. I want—I want to be as good to you as I know how.”
“I’d like that,” Sin said, in a low voice. “I want to be good to you as well. Your leg—”
Alan flinched so that their shoulders were no longer touching. “You don’t have to say anything about it. You were right, things have changed. I was wrong to bring it up.”
“No,” Sin said. “You were wrong to bring it up like that, but all the things we were yelling about are big. They matter. So I want to say: It’s a big deal, but it’s not a bad thing. And it’s not ever going to be a deal breaker.”
She took a deep breath and stared at her knees, her legs swimming in the gray flannel skirt. She wanted for the conversation to be over. She wanted to be as good to him as she knew how. But she’d had enough of misunderstandings.
“Do you see any deal breakers for you here?” she asked. “In the long term? Because I was thinking about—the long term.”
She looked up at Alan, lifting her chin and being the princess of the Market, not afraid to look anyone in the eyes. Alan had gone still.
Then, slowly, he smiled. It was like the smile he’d given her at the Goblin Market, the time she’d thrown him the fever blossom. It was better this time: It was just the two of them, and the knowledge that all the parts they played would be seen through.
“I don’t have deal breakers,” Alan said. “I look on tempests, and am never shaken.”
“Shakespeare?”
His eyes brightened. “You know the poem?”
“No,” said Sin. “I know your quoting voice.”
“Oh,” Alan murmured. He leaned forward. Sin leaned forward too.
She smiled at him, their faces so close he probably couldn’t see the smile. “I’m not like other girls,” she whispered, and she thought he could hear the smile in her voice. “You can’t just have me for a Shakespeare quotation. I thought you were meant to be a charming devil.”
“It’s true,” Alan said. “I am quite the wordsmith.”
“So?” Sin slid his glasses off and threw them gently onto the grass, and then leaned closer.
“There are so many reasons I want to be with you,” Alan said. “But I know the most important one.”
She leaned her forehead against his. “Yeah?”
“You being brave and beautiful and smart is nice, obviously,” Alan said thoughtfully. “But it’s not important. Not compared to the future we have together in a life of crime.”
“You make a good point.”
“Conning people out of their savings,” Alan said. “Forgery. Blackmail. Selling real estate on Mars. We could have it all. You with me, Bambi?”
Sin pushed him back on the grass and leaned over him, her hair falling on each side of his face. The whole world was small and quiet, the sun filtering through her hair in gold and red.
“Clive, I was with you from ‘I’m a social worker.’”
She laughed down at him. He rose on one elbow and caught her mouth and kissed her, slow and warm as sunshine, and Sin could be happy. Nobody was going to take this away.
When they left the park to pick up Toby, Alan held her hand. Sin could move with any partner, and she focused so she did not outmatch his step. An elderly lady with a terrier gave them a second look, because they were obviously together. Sin just smiled at her, and after a moment, the old woman smiled back. They passed on.
Alan charmed the day-care supervisor, of course. Sin rolled her eyes at him behind the supervisor’s back.
“I’m naturally charming,” he told her in the car. “I can’t help that.”
“I don’t have your way with words,” Sin said. “So I’m just going to go with a quick response. Ha!”
Both times they got out of the car, when they stopped for Lydie and when they got home, Alan reached for her hand. Sin rested against his side despite the difficulty of balancing Toby and measuring her step with Alan’s: She liked being there. The contact made everything seem real.
It also made things clear to Nick and Mae, who were both in the flat. Mae’s eyebrows went up, and then she grinned.
Nick’s eyes narrowed.
Neither of them said anything, because Mae was occasionally tactful and Nick was always Nick. Sin changed into a T-shirt and jeans, Alan made dinner, and everyone discussed how to get the pearl back.
“I’ll kill Seb and take it from his body,” Nick suggested.
“Your plan is always killing, Nicholas,” Alan said. “It worries me. I want you to have many goals. What if he didn’t take it?”
Nick shrugged.
“What if he did take it, and hid it?” Alan pursued.
“What are you going to do with the pearl, if you do get it from Seb?” Sin asked, on an impulse.
Nick looked at her steadily. “I’m going to give it to Mae.”
So there was yet another way for Mae to win. Sin met Nick’s eyes and wondered if he was bothered by the new development of her and Alan, or if this was just Nick being himself. It was hard to differentiate between Nick being
