5. Adrian #2
The powder room is all gold fixtures and flattering light, the kind of space designed to make women feel beautiful while they gather themselves for battle. I grip the edge of the marble counter and stare at my reflection, trying to remember how to breathe.
Vivienne knows, I think. She doesn’t know what she knows, but she knows something.
All through cocktails, she’d been circling - asking casual questions about my “outside interests,” my “charitable work,” the “friend from out of town” she’d heard I was spending time with. Every question was a probe, every smile a scalpel, and I’d felt myself bleeding out one drop at a time.
I run cold water over my wrists, an old trick my mother taught me for staying calm. It helps, a little. But my hands are still shaking, and the face in the mirror still looks like someone who’s about to shatter.
The door opens behind me.
I don’t have to turn around to know who it is. I can smell her perfume - Chanel No. 5, always, ever since I met her ten years ago. The scent of judgment. The scent of Evelyn Moretti.
“Nina.” She says my name like a verdict. “I was hoping we might have a word.”
“Of course.” I turn off the water, dry my hands on a monogrammed towel. “What about?”
“I think you know.”
She moves to the mirror beside me, adjusts a strand of silver hair that doesn’t need adjusting. Her reflection studies mine with the keen assessment of a woman who has spent sixty-five years reading weakness in other people’s faces.
“You look tired, dear,” she says finally.
“It’s been a long week.”
“Several long weeks, it seems.” She turns to face me directly, and her eyes are sharp. “Adrian’s been... distracted lately. Worried. He comes to Sunday dinner alone because his wife has ‘other commitments.’”
“I’ve had some personal things to deal with-”
“With your friend. Yes, I’ve heard.” Her voice is perfectly pleasant, which makes it worse. “Cole, isn’t it? The one who’s just returned to Newport?”
My stomach drops. “Who told you about Cole?”
“No one told me, dear. I pay attention.” She moves closer, and I resist the urge to step back. “I pay attention to what people say. What they don’t say. The way my son looks when he thinks no one’s watching.” She pauses. “He looks like a man who’s losing something he can’t afford to lose.”
“Adrian and I are fine.”
“Are you?” She tilts her head, studying me. “Because I’ve known my son for thirty-seven years, and I’ve never seen him like this. Uncertain. Anxious. Coming to family dinners with dark circles under his eyes and a whiskey habit that didn’t used to exist.”
“He’s stressed. Work has been-”
“Don’t.” The word cuts through my excuse like a blade. “Don’t insult my intelligence, Nina. Whatever is happening between you and my son, whatever secrets you’re keeping - I don’t need to know the details. But I need you to understand something.”
She steps closer still, and her perfume is overwhelming now, filling the small space like a warning.
“I’ve watched women come and go in this family. Women who wanted the name, the money, the houses. Women who took what they could and left wreckage behind.” Her eyes hold mine, unblinking. “I never thought you were one of those women.”
“I’m not.”
“Then prove it.” Her hand closes over my wrist - not hard, but firm.
A grandmother’s grip, weighted with decades of expectation.
“Whatever is pulling you away from my son - whatever is making you disappear for hours without explanation, whatever is making you cry when you think no one can hear - end it. Before it’s too late. ”
“You don’t understand-”
“I understand enough.” She releases my wrist, steps back. “I understand that Adrian loves you more than he’s ever loved anyone. More than is wise, frankly. And I understand that love like that, betrayed, doesn’t recover.”
She moves toward the door, then pauses with her hand on the handle. Her reflection meets mine in the mirror.
“Think about what you’re risking, Nina. That’s all I ask.” Her voice softens, just a fraction. “Because if you destroy him - if you break my son the way I’ve seen other women break other men in this family - I will never forgive you. And neither will he.”
Then she’s gone, the door clicking shut behind her, leaving me alone with my reflection and the weight of everything I can’t say.
I grip the counter until my knuckles go white.
Tell them, I think. Just tell them all. The cancer. The pregnancy. All of it.
But I think about Cole, hooked up to machines in a hospital room, terrified and alone. I think about the baby fluttering inside me, too fragile to announce, too precious to risk. I think about Adrian, and how he looks at me now - like I’m a puzzle he’s trying to solve, like he’s bracing for impact.
I think about all the ways this could go wrong.
And I stay silent.
***
Adrian
Nina returns to the table with red-rimmed eyes and a smile that fools no one.
“Everything all right?” I murmur as she sits.
“Fine.” She picks up her fork, doesn’t use it. “Just needed a moment.”
I look across the table at my mother, who has returned to her conversation with Harold Pemberton as though nothing happened. But her eyes meet mine briefly, and I see something there - a warning, maybe, or a confirmation of whatever she suspects.
What did you say to her? I want to demand. What did you do?
But this isn’t the place. And these aren’t the people.
“Nina, darling.” Vivienne’s voice cuts through the table conversation, silencing everyone. “I’ve been meaning to ask - how is your friend? The one who’s come back to Newport?”
The room goes quiet. Not dramatically - these people are too well-bred for dramatic silence - but the kind of quiet that happens when predators sense blood in the water.
Nina’s hand freezes on her water glass. “Cole?”
“That’s the one.” Vivienne sips her wine, all casual interest. “I’ve seen you two around Thames Street a few times. Such a lovely reunion after all these years.”
“He’s an old friend.”
“So you’ve said.” Vivienne sets down her glass with the precision of a sniper adjusting a scope. “Still, it’s nice to have someone to spend time with while Adrian works such long hours. These big houses can get so lonely, can’t they?”
The subtext is so thick you could choke on it. I watch Nina’s expression flicker - hurt, then anger, then the careful neutrality she wears like armor at these events - and something in my chest catches fire.
“Cole and Nina have been friends since they were teenagers,” I say, louder than I intended. Several heads turn my way. “There’s nothing unusual about them spending time together.”
“Of course not.” Vivienne’s smile doesn’t waver. “I didn’t mean to suggest otherwise. It’s just... people talk, don’t they? Especially in a town this small. And you know how I worry about reputation.” Her eyes slide to Nina. “For everyone’s sake.”
“How kind of you to worry,” Nina says, her voice cool.
“Well, someone has to.” Vivienne turns to my mother, seeking an ally. “Don’t you agree, Evelyn? These things have a way of becoming complicated when people don’t address them early.”
I watch my mother set down her fork. Watch her consider her words with the care of a diplomat defusing a bomb.
“I’m sure Nina knows how important discretion is,” she says finally. “For the family’s sake.”
The silence that follows is deafening.