Eve had reappeared in Annalise's life several times in the past decade, but she always faded away again. Back to her life in New York, Bonnie supposed. She imagined a woman there who had dinner waiting on stark white china plates. A woman who'd ask about Eve's trip to Philadelphia and accept the lies with a patient smile.
In her mind, Eve's partner (not wife, because there was no marriage license on file) was willowy, with golden hair that fell across her shoulders in soft waves.
In reality, Bonnie had no idea if such a woman even existed. It was just as likely that each time Eve returned to her gleaming glass condo, it waited for her dark and empty. Perhaps she'd drop her bag by the door and sip a glass of wine while sitting on a showroom-white couch, then fall asleep in the center of her bright white king-sized bed.
Bonnie knew that in one scenario, she imagined an Eve who was like Annalise- passionate, brilliant yet compulsively deceitful. She even went so far as giving her a faithful, fair-haired handmaiden who accepted all her flaws.
In the other, she made an Eve who was devoted to Annalise to the exclusion of all others. That Eve would appear whenever summoned, then disappear to her lonely, sterile apartment to lick her wounds after Annalise was done with her.
That Eve was like her, and that struck her as being more accurate.
Over the years, Bonnie told herself that the glimpses she caught of Eve sitting in Annalise's car or quietly leaving her office had innocent explanations. Eve was simply an old friend, a fellow lawyer who needed advice on a complex case. Bonnie knew the two had a romantic history; after one of Eve's brief appearances, Sam was drunk and angry enough to rant about how Annalise had left the woman for him.
He was proud about the fact that he'd won her, so Bonnie didn't point out that a woman who'll cheat with you is likely to cheat on you as well.
And cheat Annalise did, but only ever with men, as far as Bonnie could tell. She kept a close watch on the two women's interactions, but saw nothing that indicated they were anything but old friends.
Bonnie chose to believe that Annalise might have fancied women at one time, but not anymore.
The first time she heard them, it broke her heart, but as she hovered at the bottom of the stairs, Bonnie told herself it was freeing, to know that nothing could hurt more than that moment.
She'd assumed that Sam's hold on Annalise had been too great. Bonnie tried many times to find something in him that would inspire such devotion, but she couldn't see it, even though she actually liked him.
He was kind to her, and conversation between the two of them was easy. Eventually Bonnie started to idly imagine a different life, one in which Sam wanted her. Not because she was interested in him, not exactly, but because Sam was an adequate partner for an ordinary woman like her.
Annalise wasn't ordinary. Such an incredible woman should never have been with a man who was so clearly beneath her.
Bonnie had cautiously hoped that once Sam was gone, Annalise's eye might have turned toward her, but she wasn't surprised when it didn't. It was logical that she wanted a man, strong and immovable, someone like Nate. A protector.
As if what her quiet lady-in-waiting did for her from the shadows wasn't protection.
Bonnie had no doubt which one of them was more devoted, and it wasn't the one Annalise took to bed with her. But people had their own preferences, and it wasn't Annalise's fault she liked men, nor was it Bonnie's fault that she wasn't one.
Eve ruined all that. Once she heard the wanton moans coming from upstairs, and watched a tousled Eve sneaking out to her slick Mercedes, Bonnie knew that it wasn't that Annalise couldn't love women.
It was that Annalise couldn't love her.
It hurt, but Bonnie was used to things that hurt.