Part 4
“You were crying.”
“I was not.”
“You always cry when you’re frightened.”
Elena felt something cold move through her, cleaner than anger. “That is what you tell people.”
Julian’s mouth opened, then closed.
Beatrice watched him.
For the first time since the SUVs arrived, uneasiness replaced fury in his eyes.
Marianne handed Elena a business card, though they had already met. The gesture seemed designed to restore formality to a room that had none left.
“Rachel is waiting in the west sitting room,” she said. “She arrived with us.”
Julian turned toward the windows. “How many people did you bring into this house?”
“Enough,” Beatrice said.
He looked back at her. “You think this makes you strong?”
“No.”
“What, then?”
Beatrice’s gaze moved to the cut on Elena’s cheek. “Late.”
The single word unsettled Elena more than any apology would have.
Beatrice had watched Julian’s temper develop over decades. She had dismissed broken furniture as carelessness, insults as stress, and public humiliations as the unfortunate habits of a gifted man who had been given too much too soon. When employees complained, she transferred them. When friends objected, she stopped inviting them. When Elena hinted, cautiously, that the marriage was not what it appeared to be, Beatrice advised patience.
She had not created Julian’s cruelty, but she had built rooms around it.
Now she stood from the head of the table.
“I am going to speak with Elena,” she said. “You will remain here until arrangements are made for you to leave the property.”
Julian stared at her. “You’re evicting me?”
“I am asking you to leave my home.”
“In the middle of a storm.”
“There are hotels.”
“You sent drivers to block the entrance.”
“The vehicles are not blocking anything.”
He looked toward Thomas. “Tell her this is absurd.”
Thomas’s face showed no triumph. Only fatigue. “Your car is in the east garage. A driver can take you wherever you choose.”
Julian turned to Elena. “And you?”
She hesitated.
The question exposed how little she had decided. She had arranged documents, copied financial records, and met with attorneys in anonymous conference rooms. She had considered apartments and changed passwords. She had practiced saying I am leaving while driving alone.
But she had not chosen where she would sleep after saying it.
“I’m staying tonight,” she said.
“Here?”
“Yes.”
“You hate this house.”
It was true. Briarwood’s rooms were beautiful and airless, filled with portraits of people whose names Julian recited as evidence of something he had inherited but never earned.
Elena lifted her chin. “Tonight I hate leaving more.”
Julian’s eyes narrowed. “That sounds rehearsed.”
“It wasn’t.”
He seemed to have no answer for words that had not been prepared for him.
Beatrice moved toward Elena. Her hand lifted, stopped before touching her arm, and fell back to her side.
“Come with me,” she said.
Elena followed her out.
The west sitting room overlooked the front drive. Through the windows, the dark SUVs waited under the rain. Their windshield wipers moved at different rhythms.
Rachel Singh stood near the fireplace with a laptop open on a small writing desk. She was forty-two, compact, and habitually plainspoken. Elena had chosen her after meeting three attorneys who spent too much time explaining Julian’s power to her.
Rachel looked at the bandage on Elena’s cheek.
“What happened?”
“He threw a champagne flute.”
“At you?”
“Toward me.”
Rachel’s eyes stayed on hers. “Did he intend to frighten you?”
“Yes.”
“Did it strike you?”
“A fragment did.”
“Who saw it?”
“Everyone at dinner.”
“Names.”
Elena listed them: Beatrice, Thomas, Nicole, Paul, Dr. Kern after the fact, though not the throw itself. Marianne had arrived later.
Rachel typed without comment.
Beatrice remained by the door.
“Sit down,” Rachel said.
Elena sat in a wing chair. Beatrice took the sofa opposite her but perched near the edge, as though she had entered someone else’s office.
Rachel asked whether Elena wanted law enforcement called.
“No.”
Beatrice inhaled.
Rachel looked toward her. “This is Elena’s decision.”
“I know,” Beatrice said.
Elena suspected she did not.
“Not tonight,” Elena added. “I want the photographs taken. I want the witnesses’ names recorded. I want the glass preserved. I want to speak to Rachel alone.”
Beatrice’s face changed at the last request.
Elena had never asked her to leave a room.
After a moment, Beatrice stood. “Of course.”
At the door she paused. “I should have acted sooner.”
Elena looked at the rain on the windows. “Yes.”
Beatrice nodded once and left.
Rachel waited until the latch clicked. “Do you want to stay here because you feel safe, or because you want to prove you aren’t being driven out?”
“I don’t know.”
“Then we treat it as unsafe until you do.”
“There are security officers downstairs.”
“They work for the trust.”
“Beatrice controls the trust.”
“Exactly.”
Elena rubbed her fingertips together. She could still feel the tiny roughness of dried blood.
Rachel closed the laptop halfway. “Has he ever threatened to kill you?”
“No.”
“Threatened to harm himself?”
“No.”
“Blocked you from leaving a room?”
“Yes.”
“How often?”
“Three times that I remember.”
“Taken your phone?”
“Twice.”
“Controlled money?”
“He would say he managed it.”
“I’m not asking what he would say.”
Elena looked at the black screen of the fireplace. The room smelled faintly of extinguished wood and furniture polish.
“Yes,” she said.
Rachel opened the laptop again. “Do you have access to funds he cannot freeze?”
“Yes. My grandmother’s trust. And an account at another bank.”
“How much?”
Elena told her.
Rachel’s eyebrows lifted slightly. “Enough.”
The word carried none of Dr. Kern’s reassurance. It was practical. Enough for housing, counsel, and time. Not enough to make the marriage painless. Enough to make leaving possible.
“Your passport?” Rachel asked.
“In Washington.”
“Keys?”
“In my bag.”
“Medication?”
“I don’t take any.”
“Clothes?”
“Here and in Washington.”
“Any pets?”
“No.”
May you like
Elena almost apologized for the simplicity of her life.
Rachel continued. “Tomorrow morning we can file for a protective order if you choose. Tonight we document. Dr. Kern should photograph the injury with your consent. Security needs to preserve the glass and the conservatory footage.”
