登入I smiled at her, and the smile felt strange on my face, like a muscle I had forgotten how to use. Dominic had woken up and was watching me with that calm, careful attention of his. "Good morning, Dominic," I said. "Good morning, Pat." His voice was warm. "How are you feeling today?" I looked a
It started low in my stomach and spread outward, a deep and grinding pain that made me curl onto the couch in the living room, my knees drawn up, my phone clutched against my chest like a lifeline. I thought about calling Celeste. I thought about it so hard my thumb hovered over her name, and then I
So I ruled out the hospital. That left the medication, misoprostol, the kind of thing a woman could manage in the privacy of her own home if she had a prescription and a strong stomach. I knew the name from my work. I knew exactly what it did and how it did it, which was more than most women got, an
Drawing my own blood was risky. It was also the only option, because I refused to let anyone else in that lab do it. I was not about to make myself the subject of gossip before the sun had even come up. I tied the tourniquet around my arm and sat there sweating, my hands shaking so badly I could b
When Helix closed for the day and the building fell quiet, I slipped out of my office and walked to my accommodation with my head down, the way a woman walks when she is hoping to be invisible. The shower was hot enough to sting, and I stood under it for a long time, letting the water beat against t
"I feel gravely ashamed kneeling here looking at you." He lifted his eyes then, and they were red at the rims, wet in the way a man's eyes go wet when he is fighting very hard not to cry. "But I had to face what I did. Saying sorry is not enough to beg for your forgiveness, Pat. I know that. I only







