Chapter 12 #2
He glances once, quickly, at my middle, then back to my face. “We broke up eight months ago.”
I stare at him for a beat.
Then I say, very clearly, “It’s not yours.”
The words hang there between us.
He looks relieved first. I see it happen. That little release in his face, in his shoulders, the part of him that didn’t want that possibility touching his life.
Then the relief curdles almost immediately into something else. Annoyance. Suspicion. A kind of bruised disbelief. Like he doesn’t know what he dislikes more, the idea that the baby might have been his, or the fact that it definitely isn’t.
He studies me too long. “You expect me to believe that?”
“I don’t care what you believe.”
His mouth twists. “That’s convenient.”
I tighten my hold on the clipboard. “Not everything is about convenience, Ethan.”
“No?” he says. “Then tell me why you’re here. Why you took this job. Why you’re still in this house.”
I almost laugh.
“Because your wedding planner had an emergency,” I say. “Because I needed the money. Because unfortunately for both of us, the world doesn’t revolve around your sense of timing.”
“That child isn’t mine,” he says, like he’s checking the shape of it again.
“No.”
“And you’re just… what? Carrying on like this is normal?”
The question is so stupid I don’t answer it right away.
Then I say, “You’re engaged to someone else, Ethan. I don’t owe you an explanation for my life.”
His face tightens.
There it is again, that look of his. Not hurt. Ownership denied. A man who wants the right to be offended without accepting any of the responsibility that would make the offense his to claim.
He leans in slightly. “Who is he?”
I smile at that.
Not because it’s funny. Because he doesn’t deserve the answer.
“No.”
His eyes narrow. “You think keeping secrets makes this better?”
“I think keeping them from you does.”
He goes still. For a second, I think he might say something truly ugly. The kind of thing that would make me wonder exactly how I ever thought I loved this man.
Instead, he just looks at me, irritated and unconvinced, his gaze dropping once more to my body, then lifting again.
He doesn’t believe me completely. Or maybe he believes the part that matters and hates not knowing the rest.
Either way, I’m done standing here.
“Move,” I say again.
This time, after a long second, he does. Just enough.
I step past him without touching him.
Behind me, he says, “This isn’t over.”
I keep walking.
“Yes,” I say. “It is.”
I make it halfway down the corridor before I see her.
Same blonde hair. Same composed face. Same expensive kind of beauty that looks effortless until you realize how much effort must go into it. She’s coming out of one of the smaller side rooms with a shawl over one arm, and the second her eyes meet mine, I see it.
Recognition.
And just as quickly, retreat.
She starts to move past me like she did this morning, like I’m some stranger who happens to be in her way.
Not this time.
“Stop.”
She keeps walking.
I step in front of her.
She lets out a quiet breath, annoyed now, and lifts her eyes to mine. “You need to let this go.”
“No,” I say. “I really don’t.”
The hallway is empty around us. Late enough that most of the house has finally gone still, the lamps low, the carpets swallowing sound. She glances once toward the staircase as if considering whether she can still brush me off and leave.
I don’t give her the chance.
“You were on the plane,” I say. “You saw me come out of that cabin, and you told me to stay away from him. Then this morning you pretended you’d never seen me before.”
Her mouth tightens. “Lower your voice.”
“It was you.”
She looks at me for a long second, like she’s deciding whether denying it again would be worth the effort. Then, finally, she says, “Yes.”
The answer should feel like a victory, but it doesn’t. It just makes everything harder.
I fold my arms. “Who are you?”
“That’s not the question you really want answered.”
“Try me.”
She gives me a tired look. “Just know I meant what I said.”
My pulse picks up. “About Viktor being dangerous?”
Her eyes flick over my face, measuring what I know, what I suspect, what I’ve already chosen not to walk away from.
“Yes,” she says. “About him not being safe.”
The words hit differently now that I know she’s real. Not some after-the-fact invention. Not a dream, not paranoia. A woman who knew exactly who he was before I did.
“Why did you warn me?” I ask.
A shadow passes over her expression. “I don’t explain myself to you.”
“Did you have anything to do with what happened this morning?”
That catches her off guard. “What?”
“The champagne.”
Her face changes at once, not in some guilty dramatic way, just genuine surprise and then offense. “No.”
“You expect me to believe that?”
“I expect you not to be stupid.” Her voice drops. “But here we are.”
Before I can say anything, a voice behind us cuts through the hallway.
“What are you doing up so late?”
Viktor.
I turn.
He’s coming toward us from the far end of the corridor, jacket gone, shirt sleeves rolled, his face tired and alert at the same time. His eyes go first to me, then to the woman in front of me, and for one second I watch confusion give way to recognition.
He slows. Then he says, to me, “You know my sister?”