Chapter 3
Dinner opened with bowls of rich lobster bisque.
Across the table, Martin—seated at Table Twelve—sent Adam a look so fierce it felt like a laser.
Lucy’s eyes darted to Steven, who sat beside Martin brandishing a breadstick as though it were a pointer.
At the edge of her glass, she glimpsed Karina’s eyebrow lift.
“What do you think they’re talking about?” Lucy whispered.
Karina followed her gaze. “If Steven’s wielding a breadstick, he’s probably explaining in great detail why Dolly Parton deserves sainthood.”
Adam leaned forward, voice low enough only Lucy could hear. “Martin has strong opinions about Dolly. We hashed them out during a six-hour flight delay in Minneapolis.”
Lucy dared a laugh. She surveyed the other diners clustered beneath a dangling sculpture of silver fish: ten company executives clustering at one long table.
She recognized two by name—and had developed mental nicknames for the rest. The woman in red glasses was the CFO; the man with the impressive eyebrows managed international accounts.
The only other familiar face at their end belonged to Martin’s wife, Joanna, who’d introduced herself with a bemused smile and promptly ordered a second martini.
Joanna turned to Lucy now, curiosity lighting her eyes. “You’re related to Adam?” she asked.
Adam shifted in his seat, a soft groan escaping him. Lucy felt her cheeks warm. She wasn’t used to these corporate-introduction icebergs. “Only by future marriage,” she said.
For a beat, Joanna’s gaze dropped to the ring glinting on Lucy’s finger. Then she met Adam’s face. “Oh, right.”
Lucy forced a calm smile even as her pulse sped. She should have felt relieved that Joanna corrected herself—but Joanna’s tone made Lucy feel like the wrong answer on a test.
“So you’re his fiancée?” Joanna tried again, stabilizing the conversation with a reassuring press to Lucy’s wrist.
“The last time I checked,” Lucy said, glancing at Adam. He was watching Joanna now, amusement fading from his eyes. “I’m afraid to check again.”
“I’m so sorry,” Joanna said quickly. “Of course you are.” She squeezed Lucy’s arm. “Martin mentioned you had a fiancée, but I realized I never heard your name. We see so much of Karina at company events, and they’re always together, that people just assume?—”
“I know people call her my ‘work wife’,” Adam cut in, voice casual even as his knee brushed Lucy’s under the table. His tone was easy, deflecting. “A phrase we should probably retire before I acquire any more relatives.”
Joanna laughed and moved on to safer territory: the ship they’d boarded for this retreat, the route ahead, and whether the gentle rocking came from the ocean or Steven’s second cocktail.
As bowls of bisque and salads passed by, Adam kept his knee pressed gently against Lucy’s; when someone asked about the campaign, he steered the answer back to a teammate; whenever Lucy’s wine glass neared empty, he refilled it without interrupting anyone.
At home these gestures were so routine she barely noticed them, but this evening she catalogued each one as proof that she belonged at his side.
By the time the main course arrived—seared scallops garnished with microgreens—the whole table had been corrected and no longer believed Karina was Adam’s fiancée.
It had been a rumor had breezed through Northstar’s corridors, misreports carried along as casually as news of leftover pastries.
Adam himself had never heard it, but gossip rarely travels toward the person it concerns, especially when that person writes performance reviews.
Karina, who must have overheard the entire exchange, looked more embarrassed than anyone. She leaned over to Lucy as servers collected empty plates. “I should’ve spoken up when people started calling me his work wife,” she said quietly. “I thought it was obvious it was a joke.”
“So did I,” Adam murmured, though his tone carried no real defense.
Lucy watched Karina settle back. “How often did you hear it?”
Karina shrugged one shoulder, chin tilted in a half-smile. “Often enough that I stopped noticing. Mostly whenever Adam forgot an appointment and I had to stop civilization from ending.”
Steven, reappearing behind Lucy’s chair with Martin in tow, grinned. “You do enjoy preventing civilization from ending,” he said. “It’s probably the only reason you tolerate it at all.”
Karina laughed. “I also tolerate it for indoor plumbing.” She brushed a lock of hair back as Steven whispered in her ear. The ease between them was real.
Steven leaned over to Adam next. “Your COO has challenged me to pickleball at seven tomorrow. I’m holding you personally responsible.”
Martin reclaimed Joanna’s hand, and Steven vanished back to Table Twelve.
Conversation multiplied in pleasant chaos—talk of company news, personal anecdotes, future plans.
Lucy found herself drawn into a heated debate Joanna and the CFO were having over an illustrator Lucy adored.
For fifteen minutes they argued about whether the artist’s later work had lost its spark.
Adam listened, feigning interest, but Lucy caught the slight upward curve of his lips.
He reached under the table to squeeze her hand as the lights dimmed.
A screen descended behind the long table. Against an aerial photo of the Celestial Dawn, silver letters marched into view: NORTHSTAR—THE YEAR WE FOUND TRUE NORTH.
“That slogan is dreadful,” Lucy whispered.
Adam leaned close enough for his breath to warm her cheek. “I lost that argument.”
Karina popped up beside Lucy. “He wanted ‘Forward Together.’”
“That sounds like a political party founded by regional accountants,” Lucy retorted.
Karina laughed and raised her glass. “It was similar,” she said, clinking.
The presentation moved swiftly: shots of gleaming Northstar offices in cities Lucy could barely pronounce, applause at every percentage point.
Lucy watched Adam more than the screen: when his name appeared, he reached under the cloth to take Lucy’s hand, gripping it a little too tightly.
She squeezed him back, steadying both of them.
Before the photo montage began, full-color ads flashed across the screen: a tropical beach folding out of a dusty book, airline routes redrawn as constellations, a golden compass dissolving into flocks of birds.
Lucy felt a thrill of recognition—the very idea had first lived on three crumpled sheets of paper on her kitchen table.
She remembered sketching at the counter while Adam complained that their market research offered no reason to care about these destinations.
She tapped the designs out of her pens until he photographed them for the design team.
Now, seeing the polished work, she gave Adam’s knee a nudge, and he returned her smile with another firm squeeze.
The next slides showed Adam at every major event: onstage under bright lights, in conference rooms with hard angles, by airport windows with his tie casually loosened.
Always by his side was Karina, ready with phone or folder.
No surprise there—she’d chased down every launch date, rearranged his travel plans, and once tracked down a replacement suit at six in the morning when an airline sent his luggage to Brazil.
Then came a photo from the Toronto launch, projected in high resolution: Adam and Karina beneath a wall of white flowers, both dressed in black.
Karina’s palm rested flat on his chest; Adam’s head was thrown back in laughter at something just outside the frame.
Lucy’s breath caught. She’d seen a different version of this image—one Karina had texted her that night—where Lucy’s face peeked from the screen of Adam’s phone, propped between them during a video call.
Taken out of that context, Karina’s hand looked intimate.
A server glided past, carrying coffee. The warm aroma reminded Lucy of their own kitchen. In this version of the photo, Lucy had simply never existed.
The slideshow continued—holiday party under silver decorations, Lucy’s own dress recognized instantly but cropped from the scene as Adam and Karina posed arm in arm; summer picnic where he and Karina held a golden compass trophy, and Lucy, ketchup on her thumb, remained erased.
She felt a tight knot of something in her chest but forced herself to breathe.
The final sequence came faster, set to stirring music: Adam and Karina outside the Chicago theater, on the Northstar rooftop, him at a podium with her watching from the wings.
A photo of Lucy and Adam together would have looked out of place, and still, her absence pricked at her.
She realized she’d been expecting her image, as if she’d earned a spot among those highlight reels, and when it never appeared, she felt oddly excluded.
The lights rose. Applause rippled around the room. Adam released Lucy’s hand, rose to his feet, and threaded through standing diners until he reached the podium. Joanna stood first, then Martin, then the others—Lucy felt pressure to join them lest she remain the only one sitting.
Adam adjusted the microphone. His gaze swept the audience before locking on Lucy. He cleared his throat. “I was told I have five minutes,” he began, watching laughter ripple through the crowd. “Anyone who’s sat through a meeting with me knows this is an act of aggression.”
Lucy heard Karina mouthing the same line behind her, precise as a second shadow. But Lucy didn’t watch Karina anymore; her attention stayed fixed on Adam.
He moved through his gratitude list—naming team members, thanking departments that had questioned the campaign, acknowledging the board members who nearly derailed it, and praising junior staff who worked far too many hours.
His voice was confident, practiced... and then it shifted, the cadence softening.
“Most of all,” he said, “I need to thank the woman who lived through the year you’re all applauding.
” He paused, eyes glistening. “She reminded me to sleep, forgave me for answering emails during our conversations, and once removed my phone from my hand and put it in the freezer so I would finish dinner.”
Laughter and warmth rolled through the room.
Adam smiled—and for a moment, that smile wasn’t for the audience but for her.
He held the moment. “Karina, is the reason I survived this year, and I can’t thank her enough for being by my side.
This year cost her more than it should have, and I’m very lucky she still intends to work for me. ”
The applause returned, louder and more genuine. Lucy felt her face heat, her chest bloom with embarrassment. Why had she thought he would thank her? This was a corporate event, after all. Of course he would thank his assistant, that was only right. Still, her heart ached.
Joanna’s hand clasped her shoulder and she gave her a squeeze, as if she understood what Lucy was thinking; across the room, Steven lifted his glass with a raised eyebrow in a private toast.
Karina watched Adam, her expression carefully neutral until applause caught her in it; then she smiled bashfully and clapped with her hands held close to her heart.
When Adam stepped down, a small crowd surrounded him for handshakes and congratulations.
Lucy lingered with Joanna as the servers cleared coffee cups.
Through the swirl of conversations, she saw Karina slip toward Adam, reach up, and adjust his tie: loosen, smooth collar, retie.
Five seconds of domestic tenderness so familiar it felt like home—someone else’s home, glimpsed through a lit window from the street.
Joanna followed her gaze. “She takes very good care of him,” she observed impassively.
Lucy nodded. “She runs his schedule.”
“And everything connected to it, by the look of things.” Joanna’s tone held no judgment—only the matter-of-fact air of someone who understood the behind-the-scenes work of a high-powered man.
She picked up her evening bag. “I’m sorry about my assumptions earlier.
Martin talks about Adam and Karina so often that I jumped to conclusions. ”
“You’re not the only one,” Lucy’s words landed softly, more to herself than to Joanna.
Joanna studied her, perhaps catching something Lucy hadn’t intended. Before either could say more, a young man approached, phone in hand.
“Mrs. Shay, may I get a photo?” he asked.
Lucy turned.
But he wasn’t looking at her.
He was waiting for Karina.