Chương 3
Sophie noticed.
Her grip tightened.
Mercer lowered his voice.
“Daniel is waiting, and I rearranged half my morning for this.”
“You weren’t invited.”
“Your boss invited me.”
“For the financing discussion.”
“That’s what we’re discussing.”
“No.”
Claire looked at her daughters.
“This isn’t about financing.”
Daniels had remained near the entrance, staring at the floor with the expression of a man who had discovered a fascinating crack in the tile.
Mercer exhaled through his nose.
“You’re emotional.”
Alexander heard Emma inhale.
Claire went still.
Mercer continued.
“You’ve been under enormous pressure for months, and I’m trying to help.”
“By coming to my house after I told you not to?”
“That was dinner.”
“You put your foot in my doorway.”
“You were going to shut the door in my face.”
“Yes.”
“Exactly.”
For one strange second, even Mercer seemed to hear himself.
Then he recovered.
“You keep turning normal gestures into accusations.”
Claire looked at him.
“No, Richard.”
Her voice shook once, then steadied.
“I keep asking you to stop.”
Major Collins finally saw Alexander.
The major’s conversation died in the middle of a sentence.
He straightened automatically.
Reed followed his gaze.
Then Warren.
All three officers stopped.
“Colonel Hayes.”
The café seemed to quiet in expanding circles.
Alexander closed his eyes briefly.
So much for handling it without rank.
Mercer turned.
Claire turned.
Four girls turned.
Alexander removed his dark overcoat because pretending the situation had not changed would have been ridiculous.
His Army uniform became fully visible beneath it.
The silver eagle insignia caught the overhead light.
Collins, Reed, and Warren came to attention.
“Sir.”
Sophie stared up at Alexander.
Then she looked at Mercer.
Then back at Alexander.
A slow, astonished smile spread across her face.
“You really are somebody people listen to.”
Alexander sighed.
“Today is becoming very complicated.”
Mercer recovered first.
“Colonel,” he said, as if the rank itself had become a negotiation.
Alexander gave him a brief nod.
Nothing more.
Collins took one step forward, then stopped when Alexander lifted two fingers without looking at him.
The major understood immediately and stayed where he was.
Mercer noticed that too.
The color did not return to his face.
Claire looked from Alexander to the officers and then down at Sophie, who still had hold of Alexander’s hand as though rank had confirmed her original judgment rather than complicated it.
“You didn’t tell us,” Sophie said.
“You didn’t ask.”
“I asked if people listened to you.”
“That wasn’t the same question.”
Lily leaned toward Grace.
“I think it was close.”
Claire rubbed one hand over her forehead.
“Girls, please.”
They quieted.
Mercer cleared his throat.
“This has gotten unnecessarily theatrical.”
Alexander finally looked at him.
“You’re the only person here performing.”
Mercer’s jaw shifted.
Claire turned away, perhaps because she almost smiled.
Daniels did not.
He was watching Mercer now with an attention he had conspicuously avoided giving him earlier.
“Richard,” Daniels said, “I think we should end the meeting.”
Mercer glanced at him.
“We haven’t even started.”
“We’re not going to.”
“You invited me here.”
“For a business discussion.”
Mercer gave a short laugh.
“That’s what this is.”
“No,” Daniels said.
“It stopped being that somewhere around the part where four children hid under a stranger’s table.”
The words landed harder because Daniels spoke without drama.
Mercer’s face sharpened.
“You don’t know what they’ve been told.”
Emma moved before Claire could stop her.
“Nobody told us to hide.”
Mercer looked down at her.
The smile returned, but it had lost its warmth.
“Emma, adults are talking.”
Alexander felt Sophie’s fingers tighten again.
Emma did not move back.
“My name is Emma Bennett,” she said.
“I know.”
“Then don’t talk to me like I’m three.”
Claire reached for her daughter’s shoulder.
“Emma.”
“I’m serious.”
“I know you are.”
Claire’s voice had a warning in it, but pride too.
Mercer shook his head slowly.
“This is exactly what I’ve been trying to explain, Claire.”
There it was again.
Not rage.
Not even accusation.
Correction.
He spoke as though everyone else had simply failed to follow instructions.
“Explain what?” Claire asked.
“That the girls need stability.”
Grace’s face changed.
Alexander saw it.
So did Claire.
“You do not discuss my daughters,” Claire said.
“I’m concerned about them.”
“You don’t know them.”
“I’ve spent time with them.”
“Because you kept appearing where we were.”
“That is not fair.”
“No?”
Claire pulled her phone from her coat pocket.
Her thumb hovered over the screen.
“Would you like me to read the messages where I asked you to stop?”
Mercer’s eyes flicked toward Daniels.
It was fast.
Almost nothing.
Alexander caught it.
Daniels caught it too.
“What messages?” Daniels asked.
Claire looked at him.
Mercer answered first.
“She’s talking about personal conversations that have nothing to do with the company.”
Daniels’s mouth tightened.
“I asked Claire.”
For the first time, Mercer seemed uncertain which direction presented the greater risk.
Claire looked at her phone and swallowed.
Alexander could see the old instinct fighting with the new one.
Do not make it worse.
She had lived by it long enough for silence to feel safer than evidence.
Sophie let go of Alexander and stepped toward her mother.
“Mommy.”
Claire looked down.
“You said we weren’t going to lie anymore.”
The café seemed suddenly much too public.
A man near the pastry case pretended not to be listening.
The barista had stopped wiping the espresso machine.
Alexander wished, briefly and uselessly, that the entire room would mind its own business.
Claire crouched until she was level with Sophie.
“We don’t lie.”
“You say you’re fine.”
Claire’s face went still.
Sophie’s voice became smaller.
“And you’re not.”
Emma looked away.
Lily studied the floor.
Grace twisted the end of her braid.
Claire closed her eyes for one second.
When she stood again, her phone was still in her hand.
“I told Richard six weeks ago that I was not interested in a personal relationship.”
Daniels’s expression changed.
May you like
Mercer cut in.
“We had been seeing each other.”
