Mira would offer—and Eve would feel obliged to accept—a fancy cup of flowery tea. They both knew Eve preferred coffee, just as they both knew the tea represented Mira’s calming influence, a break from the pressure. At least for that initial few moments. As Eve sat in one of Mira’s blue scoop chairs she noted, as usual, the office was efficient and female, like the woman who ruled it. Apparently it didn’t bother Mira in the least to discuss the criminal mind, and the horrors inflicted on victims while photos of her family looked on. Maybe she chose calming colors in her decor and her wardrobe to counteract those horrors, and scattered those photos around to ground herself to her own reality. It occurred to her that she herself placed no photographs in her office—not at Central, not at home. Maybe, she considered, they’d be a distraction from the work, or maybe she’d just find it disconcerting to be “watched”
