“You’re here to plead Naomi’s case?”
Ethan’s tone came out sharp with sarcasm.
“Weren’t you ready to go to war with me just last night?”
Claire pressed her lips together.
“Naomi’s my best friend.
She watched you slap me.
She wasn’t going to stand there and do nothing.”
“I know you’re still upset with me.
Hit me a few times if it helps just please stop crushing her over this.”
Ethan looked at her standing there, soft and pliant, and the footage from last night flashed unbidden through his mind.
That had been the first time he’d ever hit her.
Claiming he didn’t regret it would be a lie.
He’d known Claire since he was eight.
Setting Rosalind aside, Claire was the woman who’d been a constant in his life longer than almost anyone, the girl he’d personally chosen to keep close, fought for more than once, and the one he’d thought of when the time came to actually marry someone.
But he’d been indulged his whole life, never once forced to bow his head to anyone apologizing outright simply wasn’t in him.
Squeezing Naomi instead was his workaround.
A way to give Claire an exit that didn’t require him to actually say sorry.
She humbles herself, I let it go.
That’s how this works.
It had been the unspoken rhythm between them for nearly twenty years.
Claire understood the rules perfectly well.
So she stood quietly, head lowered in front of him, playing the part exactly the way the former golden boy now CEO expected.
Ethan reached out and touched her hair.
“Alright.
Water under the bridge.
I have something for you, too.”
He opened a black velvet box, revealing a diamond bracelet inside, easily worth over a million.
“Do you like it?”
Claire looked up at him, and for one strange second, she saw the boy who used to light up her entire childhood.
But the dream had already ended.
This was just the echo of it.
She gave him a sweet smile.
“I love it.
Can I wear it?”
Through the crack in the door, Rosalind watched Claire extend her slim wrist, watched Ethan carefully clasp the diamond bracelet into place with his own hands.
A few minutes later, Ethan stepped back into the ward.
“I’ve got work to handle.
Rest up I’m heading out.”
Claire offered Rosalind an equally sweet, entirely fake smile.
“Sister-in-law, take care of yourself.
We won’t keep you waiting any longer.
Goodbye.”
She waved, and the three-million-dollar bracelet caught the light, sending a visible shudder through Rosalind.
The second the door shut, Rosalind swept the dessert Ethan had bought right off the table.
That bracelet was meant for me.
She stole it out from under me with a few sentences and got him back in the room with her while she was at it.
He stayed up all night with me last night.
What “work” could he possibly have now that’s more urgent than that?
He hasn’t let go of her at all.
That woman thinks she can steal what’s mine.
I will not let this go.
Claire and Ethan returned to Ashford Manor together.
Aunt Nora had dinner ready, saving Claire the trouble.
Partway through the meal, Ethan finally asked, “You got a new processor?”
“Mm-hm.” Claire nodded, deliberate.
“Bought it myself.
Still want it back?”
The lamplight caught her lashes, casting soft shadows like small dark wings.
Something twisted in Ethan’s chest.
“Of course not.
How much was it?
I’ll pay you back.”
Claire blinked, shook her head.
“No need.
This bracelet already covers plenty.”
“I’m your husband.
Spending on you is the least I can do.
Tell me the number.”
Now the barn’s burned down and he remembers to check the gas line, Claire thought, wry.
A little late for that.
“Five hundred and fifty thousand.”
Ethan tapped his phone a few times.
“Send six hundred.
Be good, Claire.
You can have whatever you want, not just a processor.”
To play the part convincingly, Claire steered the conversation toward tomorrow’s dinner with the Reeds.
“Mrs.
Reed loves flowers.
My father’s nursery has roses blooming right now.
I’ll loosen up the garden soil tonight and have some seedlings brought over for transplanting.
I’m confident it’ll win her over.”
Ethan smiled easily.
“Sounds good.
You’ve always handled the garden, it’s all yours.”
After dinner, Leo, one of Gordon’s shop hands, delivered a truckload of rose seedlings.
Ethan even helped turn the soil for a while.
It looked simple, but it demanded real technique: dig too aggressively and you’d wreck the roots, too gently and the soil never loosened properly.
Half an hour in, he was drenched in sweat.
But watching Claire plant each seedling by hand, watching the garden transform bed by bed into something blooming and alive, he felt an odd, rare sense of calm settle over him.
“Claire, once tomorrow’s dinner is done, let’s go pick out more seedlings from your dad’s nursery.”
Claire blinked, caught off guard.
Ethan had never once cared about the garden before.
Never noticed what bloomed, never cared what got replaced.
Why the sudden interest?
He caught her questioning look and smiled faintly.
“It’s full of life out here.
That’s what a home should feel like.”
Claire smiled, faint and unreadable.
“I’ll use that line for my post, then.”
She pulled out her phone, took three photos the rose beds, Ethan turning the soil, Ethan wiping sweat from her forehead and posted them with the caption:
He said a home should feel this alive.
She didn’t block anyone from seeing it.
The next day.
Claire spent the entire day preparing tea, snacks, and desserts, trailing Ethan while reviewing the Reeds’ preferences one more time, staying glued to his side.
When Rosalind called, Claire “happened” to be the one who picked up for him.
“Sister-in-law, did you need Ethan for something?”
Rosalind’s teeth practically ground through the phone.
“Claire, don’t think for a second I’m just going to roll over.
I’ve run these exact plays myself before.”
Claire answered, unhurried.
“Take care of yourself, sister-in-law.
Ethan’s been swamped lately.
I’ll bring him by in a few days along with some roses from the garden we planted together.”
She hung up before Rosalind could unleash whatever came next.
After lunch, Ashford Manor finally welcomed Mr.
and Mrs.
Gerald Reed the investors Ethan desperately needed on board.
By afternoon tea, the four of them were already chatting easily.
Claire happily traded planting tips with Mrs.
Reed, and the carefully prepared desserts earned her genuine praise.
Before dinner, Ethan pulled Gerald into the study to talk investment terms.
One step away from closing this.
That’s when Aunt Nora burst in, leaning close to whisper urgently in Claire’s ear.
“Ma’am the garden.
You need to get out there.
Miss Rosalind dug up every single rose.
All of it, everything you spent all night transplanting yesterday.”
Claire’s smile stayed exactly as radiant, exactly as effortless, as the blooms she’d planted the night before.
“Mrs.
Reed, please, stay seated.
I’ll go cut you a fresh bouquet from the garden.
These roses are my father’s own cultivar, you won’t find them anywhere on the market.
If you like them, I’ll have seedlings sent to your home tomorrow.”
Mrs.
Reed finished her tea and waited.
And waited.
Claire never came back.
And the more Mrs.
Reed thought about the roses Claire had described so lovingly, the more her curiosity she was, after all, an avid gardener herself got the better of her.
She set down her cup and walked straight toward the garden.