Sabrina’s face changed before I even sat down.
Her eyes moved from me to the chair at the head of the conference table, then to Jamie, then back to the folder in my hand.
Ethan remained by the doorway.
For several seconds, neither of them entered.
Jamie, who had spent six years watching nervous executives walk into rooms they thought they controlled, simply held the door open.
“Please,” I said.
“Come in.”
Sabrina obeyed first.
That alone told me she understood more quickly than Ethan did.
He followed her and took the seat beside her.
I sat opposite them, at the head of the table, and placed the folder between us.
Sabrina stared at it.
“Why are you running this meeting?” she asked.
Her voice was quieter now.
I opened the folder.
“Because your account was assigned to executive oversight.”
Ethan frowned.
“But you work here?”
“Yes.”
He gave a nervous laugh, apparently still searching for the version of reality in which I occupied some harmless middle-management desk down the hall.
“What, like senior marketing or something?”
Jamie’s expression did not move.
I looked at my brother.
“I own Rowan Strategies.”
The room became silent.
Ethan blinked twice.
Sabrina’s hand tightened around the leather strap of her handbag.
I continued before either could speak.
“I founded it eleven years ago.
I’m the CEO.”
Ethan leaned back.
“No, you don’t.”
It was such an absurd response that Jamie looked down, pretending to check the tablet in front of her.
I almost smiled.
Sabrina did not.
She knew the company she had hired.
She knew our client list, our reputation, our fees, and the months her team had spent trying to get a meeting with us.
She also knew the signature printed throughout her agreement.
Clara Rowan.
Apparently she had never connected the name.
“You’re Clara Rowan,” she whispered.
“Yes.”
Ethan looked between us.
“What does that mean?”
Sabrina turned on him so sharply that one diamond earring flashed beneath the conference-room light.
“It means this is her company.”
“I heard that.
I mean—why didn’t anybody know?”
I closed the folder.
“You never asked.”
He opened his mouth.
Nothing came out.
That sentence landed harder than anything angry could have.
For years, my family had interpreted my silence as lack of accomplishment.
They had never considered that I had simply stopped volunteering pieces of myself to people who barely listened.
Sabrina recovered first.
