Hard. Mean. Enough to bruise. She clenched her hands tight on the handle of her bag as she was swung around, wholly against her will—and then there was a man’s face much too close to hers, invading her space. The warm spring afternoon in Washington, D.C., seemed cold and hostile, suddenly. She had the hectic impression of angry words with a belligerent scowl, and the swift and terrifying understanding that this man wished her ill. And like that, she was a girl again. Helpless and scared and cowering in the corner while her father raged and smashed things, then turned his furious glare on her. Just like the girl she’d been then, she shook. “What—” she began, shocked to hear the quaver in her voice that reminded her of that helpless version of herself she’d thought she’d buried almost ten years ago. “You need to listen instead of talk, for once,” the strange man growled at her, his words heavily accented.
