Part 3
Claire’s stomach tightened. “There isn’t any.”
“The scars.”
“Prove nothing about who caused them.”
“The room.”
“Renovated.”
“You checked?”
She did not answer.
His eyes narrowed. “You checked.”
“Five years ago.”
“How?”
“I went down there.”
“Alone?”
“Yes.”
“Was it still there?”
“The doorway was. The room had been filled with old banquet chairs and rolled carpets. The restraints were gone.”
“Did you photograph it?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because I stood in the doorway for about four seconds, then vomited in a service sink and left.”
Daniel looked away. His controlled anger fractured for an instant, revealing grief beneath it.
Claire almost reached for him. Instead she picked at a loose bead on the shawl.
“There may be records,” he said.
“Records of a hidden abuse room?”
“Maintenance requests. Key logs. Renovation invoices. Security reports. Old floor plans.”
“From fifteen years ago.”
“This is a hotel. Hotels document replacing a hinge.”
“Malcolm controlled the records.”
“He controlled what he knew existed.”
She turned. “Do you think I haven’t considered this?”
“No.”
“I have spent half my life considering it.”
“I believe you.”
“Then stop behaving as though the correct sequence of phone calls will make this manageable.”
“I’m not saying it’s manageable.”
“You sound like a lawyer.”
“I am a lawyer.”
“You negotiate software acquisitions.”
“I still understand documents.”
“This is not one of your deals.”
“No. It’s my wife.”
The words were not loud, but they ended the argument.
Claire looked down. Her shoulders ached from holding the shawl closed.
Daniel’s phone vibrated in his pocket. He ignored it. A second later, Claire’s phone lit on the table.
UNCLE MALCOLM.
Neither of them moved.
The call stopped.
A message appeared.
Come back downstairs. The governor is leaving early.
Claire stared at the screen.
Daniel read the message from where he stood. “Does he always summon you like that?”
“Yes.”
“Are you going?”
She picked up the phone but did not unlock it.
Her instinct was to return immediately. She could feel the ballroom waiting: donors, executives, city officials, reporters from hospitality publications, old family friends who had known her since she wore white gloves to Christmas brunch. If she stayed away too long, Malcolm would make an explanation for her. A migraine. Exhaustion. Newlywed emotion. He had always been talented at turning her absence into evidence of weakness.
“I should say goodbye to the governor,” she said.
Daniel’s face went blank. “You just told me that man tortured you.”
“I told you he restrained and hit me.”
“You’re correcting my word choice?”
“I am being accurate.”
“You’re protecting him.”
“I’m protecting myself.”
“By going downstairs?”
“By not detonating my life before I know where I’ll land.”
Daniel paced once toward the bar, then stopped himself. “You don’t owe anyone a graceful exit.”
“You don’t understand hotels.”
“No. I understand families that use institutions as weapons.”
She looked at him.
Daniel rarely spoke about his father. Claire knew the outline: a respected surgeon, an affair, a divorce conducted through intermediaries, four years when Daniel’s mother could not get invited to the same charity events she had once organized.
“That is not the same,” Claire said.
“I know.”
“Do you?”
“No,” he said. “But I know what happens when everyone has a reason not to embarrass the important man.”
Her phone vibrated again.
This time Malcolm called Daniel.
They looked at each other.
“He knows we’re together,” Claire said.
“He watched us leave.”
“Answer it.”
“Why?”
“Because not answering will tell him something.”
Daniel’s mouth tightened, but he accepted the call and put it on speaker.
“Malcolm.”
“Daniel. Forgive the interruption. Claire’s needed downstairs. We’re losing half the room to the weather.”
“She’s changing.”
Claire looked at him.
Malcolm chuckled. “Again? I suppose becoming chair requires several costumes.”
Daniel’s eyes remained on Claire. “She’ll be down when she’s ready.”
A pause followed. Barely noticeable. Claire noticed.
“Of course,” Malcolm said. “Is everything all right?”
“She’s tired.”
“She has a tendency to disappear when overwhelmed. It’s best not to indulge it.”
Daniel’s hand closed around the phone.
Claire shook her head once.
He understood.
“I’ll let her know you called,” he said.
“Daniel.”
“Yes?”
“Tonight matters. To all of us.”
The call ended.
Daniel placed the phone on the table as though it might be contaminated.
Claire fastened the shawl around her shoulders.
“What are you doing?”
“Going downstairs.”
“No.”
She looked at him sharply.
He caught himself. “I mean—I don’t think you should.”
“I have to.”
“You don’t.”
“I do if I want the company tomorrow.”
“If the company requires you to smile beside him tonight, maybe you shouldn’t want it.”
The sentence opened a wound he could not see.
Claire secured the clasp with shaking fingers. “That is easy for you to say.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t. You built your life outside your family. I didn’t have that option.”
“You went to college. You worked in Boston. You could have stayed.”
“My mother’s shares came with voting restrictions until I was thirty. Malcolm could have sold the smaller properties, stripped the pension plan, put the flagship into a real-estate trust. He said he would if I abandoned my responsibilities.”
“And you believed him.”
“I read the trust.”
Daniel stared at her. “He kept you here with the company.”
“He kept the company alive.”
“For you?”
“For ten thousand employees.”
“That isn’t your burden alone.”
“It becomes my burden when I can stop him.”
“Can you?”
The question was not cruel. That made it worse.
Claire lifted her chin. “I will find out.”
Daniel studied her for several seconds. “Then I’m coming with you.”
“No.”
“Claire.”
“You cannot stand beside me looking like that.”
“Like what?”
“Like you want to kill someone.”
“I don’t want to kill him.”
“That is not comforting.”
“I want to put him somewhere he can never reach you again.”
“Tonight you’re going to smile.”
“I’m not sure I can.”
“You will.”
May you like
He gave a short, incredulous breath. “You sound like him.”
Claire’s face went still.
