The city was still loud with Floor 15 when James reached Maeve's door.
His phone had not stopped the whole way over. It buzzed against his leg now, one alert stacking on another, and he left it where it was. The house in front of him was quiet in the way money bought quiet, set back from the road behind a wall, the kind of place built so that no camera and no stranger ever got close to the door.
Maeve opened it herself.
She was dressed down, casual enough that it did not look like she was going anywhere. But it was the kind of casual that had been chosen, not thrown on, and James noticed the difference before he could stop himself.
She watched him notice.
"Before I decide what I'm doing next," she said, "I need to know what you really are."
Then she stepped back to let him in, and she smiled like that was exactly the answer she had been waiting for.
James came in expecting a serious talk.
He had it completely wrong, and she let him.
