Claire didn’t move.
Ethan cut a glance her way.
“Claire.”
Just her name, but the impatience underneath it was unmistakable.
She had no real choice but to follow him in.
Before the divorce went through, she couldn’t afford to provoke him, not when it might cause complications.
I’ll just sit for a bit.
I can slip out once Naomi gets here.
The Rose room was split into two halves one side set for dining, the other arranged with sofas for lounging.
Most of the guests hadn’t arrived yet, so the table sat empty while everyone gathered on the couches, chatting.
The second Ethan walked in, people scrambled to clear the center seat for him.
Someone, a little too quick with his mouth, called out, “Ethan!
We’ve been waiting forever, come sit with your wife!”
The word wife landed, and for a beat, Claire, Ethan, and Rosalind all froze at once.
Someone clicked their tongue.
“Where are your manners?
Why are you shouting?”
Derek lit a cigarette, and through the curling smoke, his glare made it clear the argument from last night’s study hadn’t fully burned out yet.
“Ethan.
Go sit with Claire.”
As long as Ethan didn’t say otherwise out loud, Claire was still the only wife anyone here was obligated to recognize.
Rosalind tugged lightly at Ethan’s shirt.
“Put me down, Ethan.
I’ll just sit beside you.”
In this circle, seating was status, plain and simple.
Given who Ethan was, even before any inheritance was settled, the center seat had always belonged to him by default.
Since the wedding, Claire had simply followed wherever he sat.
Ethan’s gaze dropped to Rosalind, something aching flickering behind his eyes.
“I told you I won’t let you be treated unfairly.”
Rosalind smiled, faint and sweet.
“It’s just a seat.
If Claire wants it, let her have it.”
Ethan’s arm tightened around her, like he’d made a decision.
“Fine.
Let her sit there.”
He walked to the far edge of the sofa, settled Rosalind carefully into the good seat, and dropped down beside her without a trace of urgency.
For Rosalind, he was happy to give up the center of the room.
“Ohhh”
Gasps and hoots erupted across the room like firecrackers.
Claire stood watching Rosalind half-hide her blushing face sweet as an overripe peach, sickly so.
Something heavy settled on Claire’s chest, pressing the air out of her lungs.
Derek yanked the cigarette from his mouth, temper barely leashed.
“Ethan!”
Ethan lifted his eyes, cold.
“Derek.
Enough.
You want to fall out with me over a seat?”
The friends who’d been at the house the night before tried to talk Derek down, urging him to let it go.
Every sentence that followed avoided saying Claire’s name outright and every one of them was aimed straight at her anyway.
They all assumed she couldn’t hear a word of it.
The comments came dressed up in lowered voices, veiled digs, casual little calculations of her worth.
Claire had already taken her seat.
The moment she’d decided on the divorce, she’d known this was coming.
Losing Ethan meant losing the right to be treated with any respect at all in rooms like this one.
Quiet sarcasm was the least of it.
The real cruelty hadn’t even started yet.
At least the hearing loss gave her something to hide behind.
She pulled out her phone and texted Naomi, asking how much longer.
Naomi sent back a crying emoji.
That heartless boss of mine changed the plan last minute.
Give me thirty minutes, I swear.
Dinner’s on me tonight to make it up to you!!
Please, in your infinite mercy, wait for me!
Claire smiled and typed back: Forgiven.
I’ll wait.
She put the phone away and looked up straight into a room full of eyes watching her like she was the evening’s entertainment.
Alarm bells went off in her head.
What did I miss?
This had happened before.
In loud, crowded rooms, if she got distracted, she’d miss someone calling her name entirely; it had caused more than one awkward scene over the years.
In the past, Ethan would patiently repeat things for her, quietly bail her out.
This time, he repeated: “Rosalind says her ankle’s in bad shape and needs ice.
You’ll handle it.”
An ice pack was pressed into Claire’s hand.
Her fingers locked around it, stiff, like she’d been shocked.
“Me?”
Rosalind tugged at Ethan’s sleeve.
“Ethan, she’s your wife.
She can’t take my shoes off for me.
If she doesn’t want to, that’s fine, don’t push her.”
Ethan frowned.
“If she’d looked after you properly today, you wouldn’t have fallen at all.
It’s generous of you not to hold it against her but she can’t just sit here doing nothing either.
She’s your sister-in-law.
Taking care of you is the least she owes you.
Claire.
Come here.”
Claire felt like a student being made an example of, in front of the whole class.
Resentment burned under her skin, but she didn’t dare refuse and make it worse.
Rosalind’s calf landed across her lap.
The pointed heel of her ankle boot looked sharp enough to take an eye out.
“Claire.
Thank you for the trouble.”
Claire met Rosalind’s smug, needling look and lowered her eyes obediently.
“No trouble at all.”
She unzipped the boot slowly, murmuring, “My brother-in-law only just passed.
I know how heartbroken you must be.
You cried so hard at the funeral it broke my heart just watching you.”
Derek choked on his drink and started coughing.
Everyone in that room could see plainly that Rosalind had already slipped into the role of Ethan’s queen-in-waiting and was enjoying every second of making Claire squirm.
Grief was nowhere on her face.
But apparently Claire couldn’t tell the difference.
Her eyes actually welled up, sincere.
“Sister-in-law, even if you sit vigil for him every night, please take care of yourself too.
Ethan and I will always be here for you.”
Something flickered across Rosalind’s face like a painter’s palette knocked over, all the careful colors smeared into a mess.
Claire pulled the boot free.
“Ow careful, that hurts!”
Rosalind yelped as her heel jabbed straight into the bandage on Claire’s palm.
Pain shot up Claire’s hand.
Her fingers curled hard into the fabric of her dress, her face going bloodless.
Ethan practically lunged across the room and dropped to his knees in front of them.
He reached for Rosalind’s foot.
“Are you okay?
Does it hurt badly?
Should we get you to a hospital?”
Rosalind shook her head, teary.
“No, I’m not that fragile.
Actually maybe skip the ice.
Claire, can you help me put my shoe back on?”
Ethan shot Claire a hard look.
“Be careful.
Don’t you understand she’s actually hurt?”
Claire stared at her own knees and said, quietly, “Be gentle with her.
You do it.”
Ethan’s composure cracked wide open.
He stood, voice rising fast.
“Claire, who exactly are you being smart with right now?
You hurt her, and you don’t feel even a little sorry?
Rosalind isn’t even asking for an apology, she isn’t asking me to punish you, she just wants some help with an ice pack.
What is this attitude?
Have I really spoiled you this badly?
Enough that you’ve forgotten basic decency?”
Claire lowered her head, looking every bit the failing student getting torn apart by the teacher.
She wasn’t convinced.
Not remotely.
But she knew that pushing back now would only make things worse, and she had nothing left to gain from the fight.
“It’s fine, Ethan, don’t be hard on her.
She didn’t mean it.
I really am okay.”
Rosalind’s hand landed on Claire’s head, stroking it gently the rhinestones on her manicure snagged in Claire’s hair and yanking sharply at her scalp.
“Claire, just hand me the shoe, I’ll put it on myself.
Ignore him, you know how he gets.”
“No,” Ethan snapped.
“She needs to understand what she did wrong today.
Claire.
Put it on her.”
Claire’s dignity was being torn apart just as precisely as her scalp had been.
Then two sharp knocks against the doorframe.
The door was already open.
Whoever it was had knocked purely to interrupt the scene.
He stood there in a sharply tailored suit, a black overcoat draped over one arm.
No tie this clearly wasn’t a formal occasion and his collar sat open just enough to give him an air of careless, unbothered authority.
His eyes swept the room, dark and clear, utterly indifferent.
He didn’t say a word.
Didn’t even step forward.
And yet every single person in the room rose to their feet, expressions shifting somewhere between eager and delighted which told you everything about exactly who he was.
Ethan’s whole posture shifted to something respectful, and he spoke first.
“Uncle.”