"Yes."
"And you didn't believe him."
"I believe what I see, Claudia. I see a woman who chose a difficult path because it was honest. I see someone who has not flinched once since the night I met her. Your father is a man who got caught with his hands in the cookie jar and then blamed his daughter when the shit hit the fan. He is irrelevant."
I hear her breathe. One long, controlled breath, the kind people take when they're trying not to cry.
"Thank you," she says.
"I don't want your gratitude. I want you to be ready for dinner tonight. My brothers and their…fiancées are coming. We're discussing the weddings."
"Okay." She says it so quietly I almost miss it.
"Claudia."
"Yes."
"You're safe. Do you hear me? Whatever he is, whatever he's done, it cannot touch you. Not anymore. Not here with me."
"I hear you."
I end the call and tell the driver to take me to my meeting. But for the rest of the drive, I think about the sound of her voice when she saidthank you, and the way it cracked at the edges, and the rage that is building in my chest like a weather system.
Edward Hartley has spent his life using his daughter as currency. First for his career. Now for his defense.
I make a mental note to ensure that his trial proceeds without interference. And then I make another note, private, unspoken, held in the part of me that my brothers call dangerous and my enemies call inevitable.
If he contacts her again, the trial will be the least of his concerns.
Claudia
The threat doesn't come from my father. It comes from a direction I didn't anticipate, which is ironic for someone who prides herself on anticipation.
I'm returning from a run to clear my head after Rovin’s call, the security detail two steps behind me, when a woman intercepts me on the pavement outside the estate. She is blonde, beautiful, and dressed in the kind of understated luxury that costs a small fortune to achieve. Her smile is precise and practiced but it doesn't reach her eyes.
"Claudia Hartley," she says. "I've been wanting to meet you."
The security detail tenses. I feel their alertness without turning around.
"I'm sorry," I say. "Do I know you?"
"Not yet. I'm Marina Sidorova. My family has done business with the Mostovois for fifteen years. Rovin and I..." Her smile sharpens. "Well, I’m sure you can figure it out."
I study her. She is polished in the way that Grace described, a perfect match for a man like Rovin. She is the kind of woman the broker would have placed directly in his path, with exactly the right pedigree, exactly the right connections. And yet it’s clear she wouldn’t be caught dead being bid on at an auction.
"What can I do for you, Marina?"
"I wanted to offer some advice. From one woman to another." She steps closer. The security detail shifts behind me. "Rovin Mostovoi is a man who collects things. Properties, businesses, people. He acquires them, holds them for as long as they're useful, and discards them when they're not. Whatever he's told you about permanence and legacy, he's told to others before you."
"Has he…” I trail off, lifting an eyebrow.
"The Mostovois and Sidorov’s are two very powerful families, they belong together, in every way."
I look at this woman, at her immaculate exterior and the bitterness festering underneath it, and I feel sympathy. The man she wanted didn’t want her, to the point where he attended the auction dinners three times in a bid to find someone that wasn’t her.
But sympathy doesn't mean I'm going to stand here and absorb her projections.
"Thank you for the advice," I say. "But I think there's a fundamental difference between our situations."
