day 1, evening
After the relief of windows, seeing the room she was supposed to stay in almost made Claire hyperventilate.
It was a cloister. That was the first word that came to mind, which was weird in and of itself, since Claire didn’t spend a lot of time thinking about monks.
But there was no other term for it—a tiny room carved into the rock of the cliff, with only a bed and a vanity and a closet.
The ceiling was close enough that she could reach up and lay her hand flat against it.
She tried to school her face calm and keep her breathing easy, but Audrey picked up on her tension. “Something wrong?”
Claire tried to shake her head, but her body was not as good at lying as her tongue was.
“I just… This is embarrassing, but I’m kind of claustrophobic.
Not a huge fan of being underground.” A forced laugh, barking, echoing against the stone.
“Is there any way I could stay somewhere else?” She felt awful asking for things, after the shopping trip and the fancy lunch and the birthday party.
Like a leech. But sleeping in here would be impossible.
Audrey sighed. “Oh, dear, all the rooms in the main house are like this, I’m afraid.”
“I could stay in one of the rooms upstairs. I really don’t mind the walk.” The gloom and strange statues and church pieces of the upper house were preferable to feeling like she was sleeping in a tomb.
“Not possible.” Quick and concise, though still pitched soothingly. Audrey touched her shoulder. She did that a lot, these casual touches, and Claire had quickly gone from being surprised by them to being comforted. “The upper rooms are all taken up by staff. I’m so sorry.”
Staff who apparently kept themselves completely silent and out of sight, and were numerous enough to overspill the houses on the shore. Claire still hadn’t seen anyone but Alton.
“And we’d so love to keep the family all together for the few days we’re here,” Audrey continued.
A tiny diamond pendant hung in the hollow of her throat; she reached up and rolled it between her thumb and forefinger.
“It’s usually just Wellsley and I at Harrow Point; Patrick and Greg and their families have their own houses on the mainland where they spend most of their time, and Ash…
he’s gone, usually.” She stumbled a little over that last part, as if she hadn’t meant to include her eldest son.
“It’s so nice having everyone close, and we would hate to split up. ”
In through her nose, out through her mouth. Box breathing, one of the few techniques from Dr. Lark that actually worked. They wanted her close. She was one of them.
“It’s fine,” Claire said when her heartbeat had gone back to a non-hummingbird rhythm. “It’s just for a few days. I can make it work.”
And she could. Though the tight space made her stomach knot, it wasn’t the full-blown panic she’d sometimes feel when the claustrophobia really ramped up.
The edges were blunted, maybe by being here with a family.
Her family, who’d accepted her so readily, who’d thrown her a tiny birthday party and given such a thoughtful gift.
Things felt… easier, since she’d been here, since she’d eaten the fancy birthday cake.
Yeah, she could make this work.
She turned to Audrey, gave her a smile that felt like a grimace. “Sorry about that.”
“No need for apologies.” Sympathy softened the planes of Audrey’s face. “It makes sense for you to have a fear of being enclosed, after the boat.”
They both froze, Audrey almost before the word had fully left her mouth, swallowing the ending t.
Silence in the tomb-like room.
“How did you know about that?” Claire didn’t know why she was whispering. It wasn’t like there was anyone else around to hear. Still, it felt like the walls themselves were listening.
Audrey recovered. Shrugged, looked away. “Elias told me,” she said, nonchalant. “I hope you don’t mind, honey, he was just worried about you. Just wanted us to know what a strong woman you are.”
Claire and Elias had hardly ever talked about the boat.
About the accident that had killed her family.
She’d told him the whole story once—most of it, anyway—when they’d been dating for nearly a year.
He’d listened, nodded, made sympathetic noises once or twice.
Held her when she cried. Hadn’t asked any follow-up questions, and she was grateful.
That was the only time she could remember discussing it, the only time she remembered even mentioning it to anyone other than Dr. Lark in at least six years.
Maybe he’d told Audrey, after Claire recounted the whole story. Maybe they’d been closer then, and he’d needed someone to help him process. She couldn’t fault him for that. It was a lot to take in.
Audrey turned toward the door, made to close it behind her, then glanced back over her shoulder and left it open instead. “Dinner is in fifteen. I hope you like it. Lucille’s family has been cooking for us for generations, and it’s always so delicious.”
○ ○ 2. ○ ○
The fabric of her new dress clung awkwardly without the flattering lights of a department-store dressing room to soften it, pulling around her armpits.
Claire smoothed it over her thighs as she carried her shoes into the hall, dangling from her fingers.
They still pinched when she slipped them on, because heels were heels no matter what they cost. Going down the stairs in these things one more time would be taking her life in her hands, but she couldn’t bring herself to show up to dinner barefoot, and she’d managed the ascent well enough.
Audrey hadn’t seemed fazed when she didn’t want to take the elevator, which made a little more sense now.
If Audrey knew of the boat, she knew why Claire wouldn’t like small spaces.
She carried her makeup bag out with her, too. Claire wanted to spend as little time in her tiny room as possible.
The balcony was tall enough for her not to worry about being seen from below unless someone was purposefully looking, so Claire walked up to the railing as she picked bobby pins from her mouth to fix her hair, propping up a compact mirror from her bag on the handrail.
It might not work as well as the mirror in her room, but it had the advantage of being portable.
The water beyond the windows was darker now, reflecting the state of the sky. Only a thin scrim of pink glow at the very top. She couldn’t see any fish.
“Did they really give you a room without a mirror?” came a low voice, behind and above.
Claire turned her head, following the voice. The prodigal Ashbury stood too close, near enough that the crown of her hair almost brushed his nose.
She lurched sideways, away, her dress sliding along the balcony rail, and snatched the compact before it toppled over the edge. “The room has a perfectly serviceable mirror.”
“You might want to use it instead of that one.” Ash seemed unfazed by her retreat, one hand in his pocket while the other gestured to her head, finger twirling.
He’d changed into a suit, perfectly tailored and dark blue with a black shirt beneath that magically didn’t clash.
The shining boots he wore with it gave him another two inches of height.
“Whatever you’re trying to do with your hair, it’s all crooked. ”
“Guess I’ll wear it down, then.” She tucked her chin and turned away without looking back at Elias’s brother, shoving the handful of pins into the new Chanel, along with the compact.
She placed it carefully just inside the door to her room, still unused to having such an expensive thing in her possession, and marched toward the stairs, careful to keep her tottering balance.
His voice still needled at her, like she should remember it somehow. It was probably just nerves, though. Making her think she’d heard it before, when really it was just that hearing Elias talk about Ash with such vitriol had fostered a weird kind of familiarity.
Ash didn’t take the hint. He bent to gather a bobby pin she’d dropped, then jogged to catch up with her, outlined in the last dregs of sunset. Claire didn’t look directly at him, but in the gleam of her peripheral vision, he looked like a fever-dream angel, something seen when a psychedelic hit.
“I get the feeling you don’t like me much.” His tone said it amused more than bothered him. He tucked the bobby pin inside his suit jacket.
“That would imply I feel anything about you at all,” Claire said breezily. She wasn’t this person, usually, but he was easy to be cruel to. Something about the way it didn’t seem to stick, as if he’d cultivated a protective carapace. Whipping boy energy.
“Ouch.” One hand pressed against his chest. It was calloused, she noticed, rough around the knuckles.
Whatever Ash had been doing while Elias took care of his shit, it had apparently been hands-on.
“Little brother didn’t speak highly of me, is that it?
I did kick his ass a couple times when we were kids—”
“I don’t want to talk about Elias.” His name still came out strained. “Not to you.”
Silence. Out of the corner of her eye, Ash’s hand fell away from his chest, leaving a wrinkle in the dark silk. “OK, then.”
Still, he walked in lockstep with her all the way down the open hall, and it set Claire’s teeth on edge. Finally, when they reached the stairs, he turned to the wall where the elevator door stood, raising his hand to the keypad. Claire continued on.
Ash scoffed. “Don’t tell me you’re taking the stairs. Not in heels.”
“Why would I tell you when you could just watch me do it?” She put a careful foot on the first step. “I’ve walked quite a few staircases in heels today.”
“There is a perfectly serviceable elevator right here. Just like there is, allegedly, a perfectly serviceable mirror in your room. What do you have against perfectly serviceable things, Claire?”