“She preferred distance,” he continued. “Privacy. Mystery. Which, as you’ve seen, rarely inspires loyalty.”
I said nothing.
Silence was safer than giving that thought a shape.
I took a measured sip of wine to gather myself. “Mother isn’t on the table.”
“No,” he agreed. “But the topic is.”
I resisted the urge to look again. I didn’t trust what I’d see if I did.
“She’s a variable in the room,” I said. “That’s all. She's nothing special.”
“Maybe,” he replied calmly. “But variables, when managed correctly, can be very effective.”
Another laugh. Louder, this time.
I clenched my jaw.
“She doesn’t belong in our world,” I said.
Richard studied me. “On the contrary. She seems to understand it perfectly.”
I turned back to my glass, grounding myself in the familiar weight, the predictable burn.
My father lifted his own. “Stability,” he said again, “can be about minimizing risk.”
I nodded, eyes forward. “Yes.”
“It can also,” he added, almost casually, “be about choosing the right variables.”
I wanted to argue with him, but my attention had already fractured.
Because she laughed again and something inside me shifted, just enough for me to feel it.
I emptied my wine glass and signalled the server to top me off.
I needed to keep my head.
That woman, whoever she was, was nothing to me.
A distraction.
And yet my father had seen her too, not as a person, but as a function.
I rejected the thought immediately.
She was just a woman in a room full of people, just like the women in that folder on my desk.
And for reasons I didn’t yet understand, I knew that wasn’t true.
Chapter 3 - Julian
Theo arrived late enough to make a point of it.
He's not rushed, not flustered. He moved through the restaurant as if time were optional, his jacket unbuttoned along with the top button of his dress shirt, and no tie in sight. His practiced smile was already in place, as if this were a casual drink instead of a family reckoning.
“Sorry,” he said easily, dropping into the chair beside me. “Traffic was a nightmare.”
