She passed him closely as she got into the back of the car and marveled again at his face. He wasn’t classically handsome. Too many sharp edges and flaws. But his looks had grown on her since he’d come on board six months ago. She hadn’t really thought about him that way in the beginning. There were lots of people in her life whose job it was to keep her safe. Some of them were also dear friends-like Elizabeth, her assistant-but most weren’t. Her father didn’t like her getting too comfortable with the staff, and she’d fallen into the terrible habit of seeing them as employees, not people.

Michael had turned into something else altogether. Not a friend, not really. They never did anything except drive. But they talked. About everything.

She’d learned he liked reading the Russians-Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Turgenev. But he also liked the graphic novels of Frank Miller. She liked to tease him about his comic books, but she’d secretly ordered a few Miller novels online, and they were…well, interesting.

He shut the door, then walked around to the driver’s side and settled himself inside. She could see his sunglasses in the rearview mirror and wished, as always, that he would take them off.

“Where to?”

“Home.”

“No stops?”

“Not today.”

He smiled at her, and she settled herself back on the cool leather seat.

She’d also learned that he didn’t have a girlfriend. Which was a lot more interesting than his taste in books.

MICHAEL PULLED INTO the mess that was traffic in midtown Manhattan, heading toward Tate’s Carnegie Hill penthouse. Something out of the ordinary had happened in the session today. He’d seen that the moment she’d stepped out of the building. He’d wait and see if she wanted to talk or if she would call her friend Sara. He liked it when she spoke to Sara. Tate never hid anything from her closest friend, and for the last few months she hadn’t whispered into the phone when she talked. It was her way of telling him about her life without seeming to bare it all.