It felt like a dream, an unnervingly tranquil one. Jervis indeed did nothing to her upon getting back to the house, just as he had promised. He led her down a short hallway to a room situated just beside his own, opened the door, and gestured for her to enter. With a calm, almost detached voice, he instructed, "Take a bath and come out for dinner in an hour," then turned and walked away without another word. She had wanted to ask him about clothes, having taken nothing from Ida's place except her phone, but she couldn't bring herself to call out to his retreating back. Luckily, she didn't need to. Upon exploring the room, she found it fully stocked. The wardrobe was filled with clothes in her exact size, there were several pairs of shoes, and even a completely new school uniform, different from the worn, second-hand one she had been using since she first got into the university. There were also new bags, notebooks, and every school necessity she could possibly need. She really hoped this was not the calm before the storm, a deceptive lull designed to lower her guard, because she absolutely did not want to reveal her true identity for any reason.
She took her bath, the hot water washing away the grime from her adventurous weekend, and exactly one hour later, she walked out of her room, now neat and clean, dressed in a pair of soft, furry pajamas. To her utter surprise, the dining table was set with a veritable feast that made her mouth water instantly. The aromas of seasoned meat, fresh bread, and savory sauces filled the air. She could hardly believe that the dangerous 6th Anderson could not only cook but cook so well.
"Sit," he said, not as a command, but as a simple instruction, as he turned from the kitchen to place the last steaming plate on the table.
She cautiously walked over and sat down, her eyes wide as she took in the spread. "Beautiful and plenty of food," she complimented, making sure to keep a layer of evident fear in her voice and posture.
He merely hummed in acknowledgment, then began to eat. She followed his lead, and a heavy silence descended upon the room, broken only by the sound of cutlery clinking against ceramic plates. It lasted until Jervis finished his meal. He carefully removed his frameless glasses, cleaned the lenses with a soft cloth, and put them back on before speaking, his gaze steady on her.
"You can be at ease around me," he began, his voice low and even. "I won't harm you. I want you to know the rumors about me aren't true; they are just cover-ups for what I really do. I am a government investigator and a detective, and those rumors are the perfect way to keep my identity hidden from prying eyes. I am being sincere with you, and I hope you can keep my secret safe."
Eva raised her hand immediately, as if taking a solemn oath in a classroom. "I promise," she declared, the gesture looking genuinely cute and childlike from every angle. Though this sudden revelation was truly surprising to her—the devil had turned out to be a police official—it somehow made him more dangerous to her. She was Peace, a notorious assassin, one the police and the government in general were desperately hunting. It was a great, ironic contrast. She sipped her drink and mentally waved the thought away; it wasn't like he was suddenly going to discover she was Peace. "So you are a good person, then?" she asked, tilting her head with feigned curiosity.
"No," he stated plainly, without a hint of shame or pride. "But to you, I am." He began gathering the empty plates.
"Does that mean I am special, then?" she asked, her voice hopeful.
He paused briefly, looking at her wide, innocent eyes. She was indeed special, he thought, with that seemingly unspoiled innocence of hers. "Yes, you are," he said.
She smiled brightly, a radiant sunbeam of a smile, and clapped her hands together excitedly. She finished her food with such a vibrant, happy energy that it made him wonder if such a small compliment truly warranted all this excitement, but he said nothing. To Eva, those words, though she knew he had said them merely to satisfy a wanting child, held real weight. He was the first person to ever call her 'special,' and that, in her lonely world, was worth every bit of the excitement she displayed. She finished her meal and helped him pack the rest of the plates, wanting to linger and not seem completely useless, but he sent her off to bed like a child, reminding her that she had school the following day. She nodded and walked away to her room. She indeed had school tomorrow, and she wasn't excited at all. It was always the same tedious events, no changes at all.
Jervis washed all the plates, meticulously cleaned the kitchen and dining table, then walked to the sitting room and picked up his laptop from the coffee table. He opened it, and his screen surfaced with an official government sigil, which meant he had a priority message. He opened it without a change in his stoic expression. There on the screen stood the message:
"Detective Jervis, you have been given the official order to take over the case of the assassin in Pink. The higher-ups hope you can hunt her out in six months, and they are guaranteeing that if you achieve this, every rumor tarnishing your great image will be cleared off, allowing you to attain the height of a senior officer."
The message ended, and there was no visible expression on Jervis's face, no reaction. All his life, he could never live as his true self. He was considered a mistake. Old Madam Anderson had quit giving birth many years ago, but in her menopausal years, she got pregnant with him, defying biological knowledge. The doctors couldn't explain how it happened, and believing it was a blessing after five grown children, she decided to keep him. She gave birth to him but almost died in the process and remained bedridden for several months. For this, both his parents and the entire family held a deep-seated resentment against him. She recovered herself two years after his birth but chose not to raise him, leaving him solely in the hands of a nanny. At age five, that nanny was brutally murdered. He was found kneeling by her body with a cold, shocked expression and a knife in his small hand. They said he had killed her. But he hadn't. He just hadn't known how to react to the horrific situation. A masked servant had approached him when he got back from school, handed him a knife, and told him his nanny needed him. When he got to her room, he found her lying on the cold floor, brutally murdered. The scene shocked him to the core; little him could only stand there, frozen. A maid had seen him then, immediately assumed he was the killer, and alerted the family. He had spoken that evening when he was asked why he killed her; he told everyone exactly what had happened. But no one believed a five-year-old's "fantastical" story. He received the cruelest punishment of his life: he was thrown into an empty, disused well on the estate grounds, to be fed with unhealthy leftovers once a day. His family members would come to the rim, curse him, and insult him. No one cared if he was fine, with the rain falling on him and the sun burning his skin. He would be brought out once in a while to be beaten black and blue. This went on for weeks until his mother, perhaps out of a sliver of pity, intervened. She let the story stand that he had killed the maid, and slowly, this chilled his heart completely towards his family. Not a single person had believed him. As he grew, more deaths and calamities he didn't cause were associated with him. At age twelve, he finally accepted the label of being dangerous. He pushed a cousin who had been relentlessly picking at him into the pool and watched from the sidelines as she almost drowned. He was punished for it, of course, but he had grown numb to the punishments already. The more he grew, the worse his reputation became, so much so that no reputable company would hire him despite his brilliant academic record. His mother eventually found a way to squeeze him into a lecturer position at the university, but behind her back, Jervis pursued his own path. The police department, having noticed his unique and formidable skills, hired him to be a secret investigator. For years, that was how it had been, but because of the persistent, damning rumors, he could never be officially promoted, despite his unparalleled skills. This assignment was a good chance to finally turn the tides, but he found he really didn't care about the rumors anymore; over the years, they had become an intrinsic part of his armor. He accepted the assignment for one simple reason: he was profoundly curious about this notorious, elusive assassin in pink.