Which proved true, when Van finally managed to haul her in through the window. She heard Tim somewhere beyond him, complaining that Van had driven his date for the evening away. “Breaking our ‘no screwing around in the living room’ rule. “Tim is currently-” He paused, to throw something at someone she couldn’t see. She covered her face with her hands, just to keep some of the humiliation in. “Evie, Evie-no.” He was laughing, but by that point she’d disappeared into some state beyond panic, and it wasn’t a comfort. “You’re having sex with someone called Tim ? Oh God, I don’t know if that’s worse or bette-” She couldn’t have stopped them if she’d tried. Words automatically flooded up through her body. “Girlfriend?” He paused, obviously considering. And Van’s face creased too, as though the idea was crazy-which only gave her unnecessary hope. Ugh, it sounded even worse on the outside. Maybe the sex he’d been having was just some newfangled tame kind, that didn’t really count. He just looked so big and warm and comforting, not to mention fully dressed. He put a hand out to her, and dear Lord she wanted to take it. His real girlfriend had probably developed the program designed to make Eve Bennett into a normal person. Lord, no wonder his real girlfriend understood the situation. “I was just…checking this was your apartment.” Though naturally, she hated herself for doing it. “Oh, hi,” she found herself saying, all falsely casual. You couldn’t hike one leg over a ladder with your cheating boyfriend watching you. He’d opened the window, and everything looked even more embarrassing than it had a second ago. “Evie! Jesus Christ-what are you doing out there?”

Sheltered by Charlotte Stein