Chapter 6
The eight guests were not eight traitors.
Important.
I spoke to them separately.
Two had gone downstairs because Coralie said I wanted them there.
Three thought Cassian’s return had already been approved.
One knew the truth and wanted him back.
Two simply wanted to hear what he had to say.
Different motives.
Different responsibility.
Cassian’s greatest talent was making every room look more coordinated than it actually was.
He had done it years earlier too.
I asked each person the same question.
“What did Coralie promise you?”
Mostly nothing.
That surprised me.
She listened.
That was the promise.
One older captain said:
“She asked what you never ask.”
“What?”
“What I think should change.”
I let that sit.
Another told me:
“You ask whether operations work. Not whether the people running them can still breathe.”
Fair.
A cousin said:
“When we disagree, you listen politely and then do what you planned.”
Also fair.
Then the one genuine Cassian supporter, Miles Harcourt, smiled.
“You want us to tell you you’re wonderful?”
“No.”
I sat back.
“I want to know whether Coralie recruited you against me.”
Miles laughed.
“She didn’t have to.”
There.
Some dissatisfaction existed before her.
She found it.
Did not create all of it.
That mattered.
The danger was not eight glasses under a pavilion.
It was my assumption that silence meant agreement.
But none of that changed the elevator kiss.
None changed Finnian.
None changed the fact Coralie intended to use social pressure inside our marriage rather than trust me enough to risk a direct answer.
I could reform structure later.
First, betrayal.
When I returned to the ballroom, Adela was waiting near the door.
“Sir?”
I stopped.
“Finnian thinks he ruined your engagement.”
My anger shifted instantly.
“Why?”
“He heard guests talking.”
Of course.
Children hear consequences and assign themselves authorship.
I went downstairs.
Finnian sat on a sofa with a glass of milk he had not touched.
He looked up.
“I’m s-sorry.”
“No.”
Immediate.
He flinched at my firmness.
I softened.
“You did not cause anything.”
“But I said—”
“You answered a question.”
His eyes filled.
“Coralie said I ruin things when I keep talking.”
There.
Not only tonight.
I looked at Adela.
May you like
She went pale.
Finnian had been taught silence before the microphone ever appeared.
