The sunlight wakes Adam, not his alarm.

He feels more comfortable that he usually does when he wakes. The blankets are softer; the mattress is more expensive. At first, he thinks it's just because he's back at home, in his house, and not that awful apartment. But then blinks open his eyes, and realizes that he is not in his apartment, and he is not in his house.

The sunlight glistens on Eris' skin, her head curled into Adam's shoulder as she sleeps. She looks younger, looks a little less composed. Her hair is messed enough to scare away that perfect shine, and the thin liner around her eyes is slightly smudged. One of her arms rests over Adam's chest, her hand around his bicep.

Adam glances out the window, where the city is waking up. It's later in the day already, perhaps nine, ten—

Adam feels his heart smatter. Daphne's party. Daphne's party, at the house he lives in, where he is supposed to go home to every night, where he didn't sleep last night. He slips away from Eris, trying to find his shirt, his pants—anything. He doesn't know where his phone is. He doesn't know where his keys are. Eris stays dead asleep in the middle of that massive bed.

Outside Nyx, Nikolas scans his key card, practicing his speech. I'm sorry for getting physical with you, Eris. It's a bad habit that I'm trying to fix. It won't happen again—

Nikolas sighs, opening the door and walking through the foyer. The restaurant is switching over from breakfast to lunch as he walks through. Eris won't buy that, because he's said it a thousand times.

Look, Eris. I just have a bit of a confidence problem. It's just because you're so incredible that sometimes I feel a little bit jealous—

Nikolas rolls his eyes and scan his card again to access the hallway. Eris will think that's stupid.

Adam can't find his phone. He's found his clothes, found his keys inside his jacket, but he still can't find his phone. The sunlight drenches the apartment, and Adam starts to sweat as he looks for his phone. There's a full glass of gin on the table and an empty martini. No phone. Where is his phone?

Nikolas scans his card at the penthouse floor. It doesn't work the first time. Damn Eris and her broken little card system.

Finally, Adam finds his phone in between one of the couch cushions. Nine-forty-eight. Six missed calls from Sarah. Daphne's party was supposed to be at nine. Adam is late. Late because he slept with a criminal he's currently investigating.

Adam runs his hand through his hair. He slept with her. He slept with Eris.

What an awful, awful decision. He tucks his phone in his jacket and wrestles with the door. He's parked nearly a kilometre away. He's going to be late late.

Adam opens the door at the far end of the hallway and runs into Nikolas, who just managed to get his card working again.

Adam stares at Nikolas, and Nikolas stares at Adam.

"Some cop," Nikolas says.

Adam pushes by him, down the stairs. Eris can deal with that. Adam didn't cheat on anybody.

Adam blinks. Did he? What did he and Sarah agree on? Just being for a certain amount of time? Still, he doubts this will be okay with her. He shakes his head as he leaves the building. Stupid Adam.

Adam drives Eris-style to Sarah's house—no, his house. There are cars parked down his street—Daphne's friends. Little balloons are blown up around the windows of the house—balloons that Adam was supposed to help Sarah blow up, because she gets a headache from it.

Adam pulls in next to the SUV, getting out. Daphne's present is in the trunk, so he wrenches it out before he bursts through the door.

Sarah is perched on the end of the couch, watching Daphne and her friends open presents. She glances at Adam as he opens the door, then gets up and walks over to him.

"I'm sorry. I'm sorry I'm sorry I'm sorry, Sarah—"

"It's okay, Adam. As long as you're here."

But Sarah knows. Sarah knows because Adam has that look to him, the messy-haired, frantic look he has when he's done something wrong. And the buttons on his shirt have been buttoned all wrong.

"I'm sorry," he breathes, and now he's not apologizing for being late.

"It's okay, Adam," she says. She reaches out and re-buttons his shirt properly.

"Sarah—"

"It's okay, Adam," she repeats. "We didn't agree on anything."

Sarah is falling apart. She's shattering into a million pieces. She wasn't good enough. She didn't have that confidence, that excitement. Four days? That's how long she kept him interested?

She wants to ask who it was. Some random girl at a bar or someone he's been seeing before her. She really wants to know, but she doesn't ask. She takes the present from him, smoothens out his hair, and leads him over to Daphne

Adam has calmed his breathing. She's upset; she's feeling self-conscious, not good enough. He can see that clearly. He'll fix that.

They don't speak to each other for the next few hours. Adam cleans up the wrapping paper, says goodbye to the other parents. He checks on Daphne, playing in the living room with a stuffed version of Neptune.

"You get that for her?" Adam asks Sarah, who is cleaning sprinkles off the counter.

She nods. "I thought she'd like it."

Adam knew Daphne liked the planets, Neptune in particular, but he didn't know that Sarah even knew what planet Neptune was.

"Sarah—" he starts, but his phone begins to vibrate. Adam glances at it. It's Wilkes. "Sorry, I have to—" He cuts himself off, walking into the hallway.

"Hello?"

"Hughey, you've fucked yourself."

Adam checks the contact. The evening sun is pouring through the window, making it hard for him to see who it is. After second glance, it's definitely Wilkes.

"Sergeant Wilkes? What's going on?"

"Have you looked at the news, Adam? Have you even bothered to look at the shitstorm you've caused?"

Adam's heart is racing. "What news?"

"You fucked her, Hughey? Are you serious?"

Adam blinks. "You—you're not talking about—"

"Our famous little drug mule? Damn right. Headlines, Hughey, big headlines."

"What headlines?" Adam puts the phone on speaker, then brings up the news. Scrolls to the first article. "Oh, god," he breathes.

"That's right, Hughey. An anonymous witness saw you leaving the Nyx complex this morning. The media's eating this shit up—the personable criminal and her doe-eyed cop. After the buy incident, Adam, this shit is big. They're romanticizing the shit out of dealing drugs."

Adam covers his mouth with his hand. Nikolas saw him; Nikolas is dating Eris. Nikolas is mad; Nikolas calls the media.

"I can't deal with this internally, Adam," Wilkes is saying. "They're talking termination."

"Wilkes—" Adam cuts himself off, confused how this go so out of hand, so fast. "Wilkes, I worked my ass off to get this position. To get this job."

"I know that, Adam, and if the media didn't have a hold of it, I'd bring you in for a talk and we'd get it sorted out. But the people are going to want to know what sort of disciplinary action we have for this. She's in the middle of suing us, Adam. You're in the middle of trying to put her in jail; I don't know what you were thinking."

Adam wasn't thinking. The gin was thinking. He runs a hand through his hair, closes his eyes. He wants to blame her. Her, the diamonds in her ears and the straps on the dress. He wants to question what was in his drink. He wants to play the narrative that he was manipulated, that he was helpless. But Adam had wanted it more than he'd wanted anything.

"I'll do whatever I can," he says. "Talk to whoever, apologize to whoever. Take me off the Diakos case—please don't fire me."

"Out of my hands, Hughey. I'll let you know a decision is made."

Adam hangs up the phone. Eris. Damn Eris. Eris, Eris, Eris. The goddess of chaos.

Eris, however, isn't being chaotic. At that moment, she's stirring a martini around with a straw, tapping the counter of her penthouse.

She has not made her bed today, has not checked her phone. She's been going through every second of last night, picking apart what she possibly could've done wrong to make him leave so early. Without an explanation. She hates waking up alone.

Regret—that's what he's feeling, probably. Regret. He's cursing her name, cursing that she's messed things up with Sarah nearly the minute he moved back in with her.

Eris stirs the martini mindlessly. She wants to go back to that moment, where he took her shoes off. Right before it gets really good, but not towards the end. She wants to sit there forever.

Eris sips from the martini. She's wearing an oversized Streetheart shirt that she snatched from a hookup the year she moved here. It's just the right amount of worn, and she likes the music enough to not feel like a fraud. In some way, it's comforting.

Eris looks down at the martini. It's completely empty, so she pushes away the glass and checks the clock on the stove. It's been nearly twelve hours. She can call him now. Right?

She opens her phone to get his number from her notes, but she finds seven missed calls from Peter and four from Kayla. None from Nikolas.

Eris knows exactly what that means. She slides to the news and clicks on the first webpage.

Oh. That's why he left. That's why he's not reaching out.

Eris dials his number. He doesn't know she has it, so he'll probably pick up. He does.

"Hello?" His voice is rough, exhausted. It shakes Eris to her bones, curls around her heart.

"Adam? It's Eris."

The line clicks dead.

Eris glances at the phone. That's fine. She'll fix this. She dials it again; he doesn't pick up. Eris checks her notes and dials Wilkes' personal number. He doesn't know she has that, either.

"Wilkes speaking."

"Hi Wilbur, it's Eris. Look, the media has it wrong—"

"Eris Diakos?" His voice muffles as he checks the number. "How the hell do you have this number?"

"Just listen. That never happened. Adam wasn't here."

The other line is silent. Then, "He already insinuated he was."

Idiot. "Well, you know Adam. He's a little loopy sometimes. Gets his wires crossed, ends up forgetting things—"

"They're going to take him off major crime, you know? A place he worked his whole life to get to. They're not going to fire him, lucky him, but they're going to put him in a different division. Some desk job."

"It never happened—"

"Delete this number," Wilkes says. "Stop selling coke. Stop sleeping with cops."

The line clicks dead. Eris' heart races. She should've checked her phone earlier. Should've had this shitstorm under control before it went too far. Anonymous source. Eris knows who it is, but she checks the cameras in the hallways just to make sure. And sure enough, there it is. Adam fleeing from Eris and running into Nikolas.

She calls Kirk first, who works at the news company that printed the original article.

"Kirk speaking."

"Hi Kirk. It's Eris."

He laughs a little. "Look at that. Our city superstar. How are you?"

"Great. Look, Kirk, I have to call in that favour."

"Oh, come on Eris. Don't make me pull it. It's a great article. It's getting views like crazy."

"I need you to pull it. Print the correction."

He sighs, spinning a pen. "Fine, but you're using your favour. I'll pull the article, but I need the source to call me and ask for the correction if you want that, too."

"Nikolas will call you within the hour. Just have it ready."

"Yeah. Sure. You're awfully mean. A career-ruiner."

Eris hangs up. She calls Nikolas, but he doesn't answer. So she takes her keys and leaves the house in an old band t-shirt and sweats—something she's never done. She ducks and runs to her car, but there's no photos. She drives to the south end, where Nikolas lives. Since he stopped getting the manager paycheck, he had to move back into an apartment in the south end. He spends his money the moment he gets it, and now he pays.

She throws her entire body against the apartment doors multiple times to get them to let her in. She slips by them and takes the stairs two at a time. She ducks out of the way of the peephole.

It's just blood, she tells herself, and she knocks.