“I lied.”

Those were the first words out of my mouth as Donna hopped into my black sports car.

Though, really, that was a lie too; after seeing Donna’s reaction to my mention of the work trip, I’d decided to switch it out for something more spontaneous. But I couldn’t have her knowing that, have her suspecting that this might be more than just a nice release. Because it wasn’t. It couldn’t be.

Even in the dark, I could see Donna’s big blue eyes were narrowed already, so I wasted no time in telling her.

“We’re off to somewhere different tonight—in town. Just for the night.”

She still wasn’t looking at me. Although our latest meeting in my office had only been two days ago, I would’ve thought that she would’ve been more pleased to see me. As least as pleased as I was to see her.

But all she said was, “Okay.”

I put my hand on her shoulder.

“That’s it?”

Her answer was immediate. “I thought I’m not supposed to talk, that you didn’t want me to.”

Different answers jousted in my head: “Of course I do, babe,” “Donna, what’s the matter?” and “You misunderstood me; that was just for fun, for sex.”

“Okay,” was the one that came out.

The rest of the ride was one long, tense silence. Donna said nothing, just kept her head twisted determinedly to the window.

“You know,” I said finally, “I’m not paying you to talk, but it wouldn’t hurt.”

Again, another immediate and cold answer: “How was your appointment the other night?”

As I weaved past a particularly slow minivan on the road, it took me a minute to process what Donna had said. Our last office tryst had been three days ago. She must have been referring to my excuse for leaving. It had been a lie, of course, but she didn’t know that.

My glance at her confirmed it. With the hard line her mouth was in, there was no denying it. This cute, ridiculous girl was actually jealous.

“As good as could be expected. My brother isn’t one to be dislodged easily.”

Now, she turned to look at me head-on.

“You have a brother?”

I nodded.

“Not many people know, because I don’t want them to.”

Silence, then, “Why?”

More lies swam through my head, but it suddenly seemed easier to just tell the truth.

“I don’t like him, I don’t get along with him, and he reminds me of painful parts of my life that I don’t like thinking about.”

Donna was looking at me strangely, in a way she never had before.

“Oh,” she said. She opened her mouth again, then, as if thinking better of it, closed it. In a soft voice, she finally asked, “Why?”

I kept my gaze on the road ahead as I said it, concentrating my eyes on the long stretch of highway ahead of me so I wouldn’t see it in my mind again.

“My mother killed herself, and I found her. I was 14.”

The silence was the same as when I had found her, but at least I was doing good focusing on the long strip of gray road amid the swath of navy sky ahead of me and not seeing Mom’s gray, lifeless face.

“Oh, Carter, I’m sorry,” Donna said, putting her thin fingers atop my tense claw.

“It’s fine,” I replied tersely, focusing on the view ahead of me—the gray and the navy. “She wasn’t happy.”

Another shocked silence. Donna was probably contemplating how to respond to the most inappropriate of responses.

“But finding her, losing her like that…that must have been so hard for you.”

The gray and navy were unending, the same road, the same sky, the same drab colors for this drab day. Donna was expecting an answer from me, some show of something. She was going to be disappointed.

My words came out cold. “We’re almost there. Ten more minutes.”

This next silence was disappointed or expectant or some combination of the two.

Finally, Donna said, “I can’t stand it when you get like this.”

“Like what?”

“When you just—I don’t know—shut down. Like you don’t feel anything, like you’re…” Her voice trailed off, her gaze following mine to the horizon.

“Like what?” I asked again, and she didn’t say anything.

“Like what?” I questioned once more.

“Like you’re just how people say—a sociopath who’s incapable of feeling anything.”

At her words, a smile twisted onto my face. Turning to look her in the eye, I said, “Be careful what you hear, Donna. It just might be right.”

I didn’t react as her defiant eyes scanned my face for a crack in my expression, an uncertainty, anything. Too bad for her, I was more practiced at this than she was.

Finally, with a muffled sort of sigh, Donna turned to the window without another word. I returned my gaze to the horizon, where, in the dark distance, the tall structure of where we were heading loomed, just visible.

Donna didn’t understand. The rumors were right. I couldn’t feel, I couldn’t afford to. If I let out the tidal wave of emotion surging within me, I would be engulfed by it entirely.