The morning sun streaming through the attic’s small windows tells Nina it’s later in the morning than she’d expected. She stretches. Yawns. She’d been dreaming of something that has left her faintly disturbed, but she cannot now recall what the nightmare had been.

Beside her, the bed is empty, the sheets cool. She runs a hand over the smooth fabric. Ewan must be downstairs. When she concentrates, she smells the delicious scent of coffee, the real stuff, wafting up from downstairs.

When she pulls off the comforter, her naked body reminds Nina of the night before. They’d made love for hours. Remembering that pleasure now, she shivers. Grins. She arches and writhes on the bed, overcome with joy.

She is in love, utterly and completely. She’s never been so happy, not ever once in her life. She is going to be in love with this man forever and ever, until they are both wrinkled little apples sitting in rocking chairs on a front porch, watching their great-grandchildren gambol like lambs on a front lawn kept green with all of his money.

She finds Ewan in the kitchen, standing by the stove. He turns, a cloth flung over one shoulder. A smudge of flour streaks across his cheek. His dark hair, delightfully tousled, prompts Nina to run her fingers through it. She kisses him, savoring his flavor. He is delicious. She wants to eat him up. Nibble. Lick. Devour.

She loves him, she is in love, they are going to be happy forever. A fairy tale. A dream.

Loving Ewan is a dream.

“You’re making me pancakes?” Nina asks him.

“I’ve had a craving for them since we got home,” Ewan says. “They’re what my mother always made for me when I was a kid and stayed home sick from school. Middle of the night, it didn’t matter. She’d make me these pancakes, and no matter how bad I felt, I’d feel better.”

“Do you feel bad about something, Ewan?” The words come out of her mouth but sound as though another person has spoken them.

She is in love. Isn’t she? Forever. Children gamboling. Rockers rocking. Lambs screaming, people dreaming.

Nina is at the table.

Ewan pushes a plate toward her. “Eat. Can’t have my girl getting too hungry. Because I’ve spent plenty of time making sure your stomach is fed, but I haven’t done much to make sure anything else is satisfied . . .”

Nina is in the living room, looking at the books. She plucks a volume off the shelf, turning with a grin. Wuthering Heights.

“I haven’t read any of them,” Ewan says. “Well, except maybe that Dr. Seuss up there on the shelf.”

“I’ll read it to you.” Nina flips through the pages.

The words run together.

The book weighs a ton, too heavy in her hand.

She is on the couch, her tablet in hand. Wuthering Heights, the book she’s been reading, on the screen. A favorite. She loves the story of the ill-fated lovers who can’t get themselves together enough to make their love work.

She looks up at Ewan sitting at his desk. “When . . . when did you put your desk in the living room?”

Nina is in bed. The early morning light streaming through the windows tells her it is later than she’d expected. From downstairs drifts the delicious smell of coffee, the real stuff, not synth. Ewan will be making her breakfast. She is naked. They’d made love.

She loves him.

He loves her.

They are in love and happy and forever and love and happy and happy and happy . . .

“I want to make things up to you,” Ewan says. “I’m making pancakes. I’m not sure I can. I’ve had a craving for them since we got home. I don’t know how. But I want to. They’re what my mother always made for me when I was a kid and stayed home sick from school. Middle of the night, it didn’t matter. She’d make me these pancakes, and no matter how bad I felt, I’d feel better. More than anything else. I hope you can believe me.”

“Of course I believe you. Why wouldn’t I believe you?” Nina puts her fingertips to her temple, where a steady, aching pulse throbs and becomes a sharp, spiking pain. She blinks away a reddish haze. She is suddenly unsteady on her feet. Ready to fall.

“This isn’t normal, Nina. So help me, then,” Ewan says. “Help all of us.”

“What do you want from me? What do you need me to do?” Nina gasps as a fresh stab of pain slices at her from the inside out. She doubles over at the table, her hands flat on it but nails scratching at the varnish, digging in deep enough to bend them back. More pain.

“Tell me where it is,” Ewan says.

She falls back in her chair with a cry of agony. “What? Tell you where what is?”

“The tech, Nina. You have to tell me where the tech is.”

She will do anything to give him what he wants and needs from her; she will give herself up to anything to rid herself of this pain. She will lie, if she has to.

So that’s what she does.

“Will you tell me where it is?” Ewan says. “Just tell me where the fucking tech is, Nina, let me in. Let me the fuck in!”

Nina says yes.