Brock Cunningham

Quick Facts

• Role: Picture-perfect boyfriend who becomes a foil and stress test for Millie’s secrets and the novel’s exploration of Deception and Manipulation
• First appearance: Early in the novel as Millie’s new, “too good to be true” partner
• Occupation/Age: Thirty-two-year-old lawyer from a wealthy family
• Key relationships: Millie Calloway; romantic rival to Enzo Accardi
• Notable details: Immaculately groomed (Brooks Brothers suits, professionally shaped eyebrows, gleaming white teeth); has atrial fibrillation, takes digoxin—an innocuous fact that becomes plot-critical

Who They Are

At first glance, Brock Cunningham is the embodiment of the safe, conventional dream: handsome, successful, impeccably mannered, and seemingly uncomplicated. He’s the kind of man who offers a two-bedroom apartment overlooking Central Park and the promise of normalcy. That polished surface also makes him the ideal vessel for the theme of Appearance vs. Reality: the more perfect he appears, the more the story invites us to question what his “perfect” can actually withstand.

The text lingers on Brock’s sleek exterior—trim suits, groomed brows, brilliant teeth—yet embeds a crack: his heart requires careful regulation. His atrial fibrillation, treated with digoxin, becomes the novel’s slyest detail, linking his orderly life to chaos later on. Brock is both Millie’s temptation and her test: can her messy truth survive inside his immaculate world?

Personality & Traits

Brock’s personality is built for reassurance—until it isn’t. Initially he functions as a soft landing for Millie, offering dinners, comfort after job loss, and persistent invitations to move in. But the security he offers is conditional on ignorance: he wants a version of Millie that never complicates his image of stability. When reality intrudes, the persona cracks, revealing a man who prioritizes appearances over empathy.

• Idealized and “perfect” on the surface: A polished lawyer from a good family, he wears Brooks Brothers suits and projects control and success—traits Millie admires and distrusts at once.
• Supportive (at first): He worries when Millie stands him up, tries to cheer her after she’s fired, and repeatedly offers safe housing—signals of care that also pressure her to conform.
• Persistent to a fault: His repeated “move in with me” refrain highlights a benevolent insistence that becomes coercive, intensifying Millie’s fear that intimacy will expose her past.
• Naive/trusting: He accepts flimsy excuses for her disappearances and cancellations, choosing not to investigate—a willful ignorance that keeps his ideal intact.
• Judgmental and conditional: The moment Millie’s criminal record surfaces, his composure dissolves. He withdraws both legal and emotional support, revealing that his love depends on a sanitized story of who she is.

Character Journey

Brock’s “arc” is less transformation than revelation. He enters as the fairy-tale boyfriend who promises safety and upgrades—love as an elegant apartment with a doorman. But the police station exposes the limits of that promise: learning of Millie’s past and the suspicion hanging over her, he cannot reconcile the woman he adored with the woman in front of him. In one scene, he goes from comforter to stranger, opting out as both boyfriend and lawyer. His brief return in the epilogue—calmly retrieving an extra bottle of digoxin—cements the hollowness of the fantasy. The tidy man with the regulated heart becomes the mechanism by which the story ties “good life” optics to violence and consequence, stitching his perfection to Millie’s final act of justice.

Key Relationships

• Millie Calloway: Brock loves Millie’s curated normalcy—the put-together version of a woman who will slide seamlessly into his life. Their romance depends on silence: as long as Millie’s past stays hidden, Brock can keep pretending he’s the man who saves her. The moment truth arrives, he recoils, reinforcing Millie’s fear that ordinary happiness is off-limits to someone with her history.

• Enzo Accardi: If Brock is conventional safety, Enzo is dangerous loyalty. Brock’s failure to protect Millie when the law turns on her contrasts sharply with Enzo’s rule-breaking protectiveness. Side by side, they clarify what Millie actually needs: not pristine appearances, but someone who will stand in the mess with her.

Defining Moments

Brock’s most revealing scenes dismantle his “perfect boyfriend” façade while tying him to the novel’s climax.

• The Move-In Offers

  • What happens: Brock repeatedly urges Millie to move into his Central Park apartment.
  • Why it matters: His generosity doubles as pressure, turning safety into surveillance. The offers symbolize a life that would expose Millie’s secrets, making “protection” feel like a trap.

• The Police Station

  • What happens: Confronted with Millie’s record and the Garrick investigation, Brock withdraws as boyfriend and as lawyer, unable to reconcile his image of her with reality.
  • Why it matters: This is the breaking point where his love is revealed as conditional. The ideal collapses under scrutiny; he chooses reputation and propriety over intimacy and faith.

• The Epilogue and the Digoxin

  • What happens: Brock returns only to pick up his spare bottle of digoxin.
  • Why it matters: The impersonal errand confirms the relationship’s end and quietly explains the mechanism of Wendy Garrick’s death. His controlled, clinical world is repurposed as a tool of Justice and Revenge, fusing order with violence.

Essential Quotes

"Come on, why don’t you want to move in with me, Millie? I’ve got a two-bedroom apartment overlooking Central Park, in a building where you won’t get your throat slit during the night."

This line encapsulates Brock’s blend of care and control. He frames protection as an upgrade and safety as an address, revealing how his love is inseparable from status and containment. The casual violence in the joke also shows how little he understands the realities Millie navigates.

"I just want you to know, that whatever terrible thing you feel like you need to tell me about yourself, it’s okay. I love you no matter what."

A promise of unconditional love that proves aspirational at best. The sentence is tender but vague—his reassurance depends on not knowing the truth. When the truth arrives, the statement collapses, turning this quote into tragic irony.

"I can’t represent you, Millie. It’s not appropriate, and… I can’t... Honestly, I don’t even know who you are."

Here the façade breaks. The professional excuse (“not appropriate”) masks a personal refusal, and the final admission—“I don’t even know who you are”—reveals how thoroughly he loved an illusion. The moment exposes the limits of his empathy and the primacy of appearances in his moral calculus.

"Is my extra bottle of digoxin in here? The one I used to keep in your medicine cabinet for when I spent the night."

Delivered like a logistical afterthought, this request is the novel’s quiet detonator. It transforms a private, intimate detail into the key that unlocks the ending, binding Brock’s ordered life to the story’s lethal turn. The line’s chill lies in its normalcy: a tidy man tidying up, unaware of the consequence he’s set in motion.