Now it sat in my palm like a final instruction from the dead. I slipped it into my wallet without fully knowing why. Maybe because it was the last thing my father had given me. Maybe because when everything living had failed me, the memory of him still felt like shelter.
By the time I zipped the suitcase closed, I was shivering even though the heat was on. I walked back through the hallway with the bag in one hand and my purse over my shoulder. Ryan didn’t turn his head when I entered the living room.
He was stretched across the sofa, jacket off, one arm thrown over the back cushion, staring at the television as if this were any other evening. The sight of him like that almost undid me. Cruelty should look monstrous, but sometimes it looks relaxed.
I stopped near the doorway and waited, still hoping for some final crack in his performance. “That’s it?” I asked. “After eight years, this is how you want it to end?”
He glanced at me then, and whatever softness I had once found in his face was gone. “Don’t make this harder than it has to be, Emily.”