Riley stared at the document in Mason’s hand as though the paper itself had struck her.
For the first time since she had ordered security to search me, she stopped performing for the room.
Her shoulders went rigid.
Her fingers tightened around the broken sapphire necklace.
The confidence that had carried her through every accusation vanished so quickly that even I noticed.
Mason noticed too.
He took the page from Rocco without looking away from her.
“What is this?” Riley asked.
Her voice was smaller now.
Rocco answered calmly.
“The preliminary incident report from this floor.”
Riley exhaled.
For half a second, relief crossed her face.
She thought it was only about what had happened in the lobby.
Then Rocco added, “Along with the access records and security footage requested this morning.”
Riley’s expression changed again.
I looked between them.
“This morning?”
Mason turned to me.
“Are you hurt anywhere besides your face?”
“I’m fine.”
His jaw tightened.
“Tessa.”
“The babies moved.
I’m scared, but I’m not bleeding.
I don’t think I fell.”
Eleanor stepped beside me and took my hand.
“We’re getting you checked anyway.”
Riley gave a brittle laugh.
“This is absurd.
She stole your necklace, and somehow I’m the criminal?”
Eleanor slowly turned toward her.
“You are holding a necklace I personally gave my grandson permission to place around his wife’s neck.”
“I didn’t know she was his wife.”
“That excuses tearing it from her body?”
Riley looked toward the employees gathered around us, searching for sympathy.
“She was pretending to be an ordinary employee.”
“I was working,” I said.
“You were hiding.”
“I was protecting my privacy.”
Riley scoffed.
“From what?”
Mason answered before I could.
“People like you.”
Silence rolled across the lobby again.
Riley’s face hardened.
“You don’t know her.”
Mason’s eyes shifted to her.
“I know exactly who my wife is.”
The word wife sounded different the second time.
Not like an announcement.
Like a boundary.
I had entered our marriage believing boundaries were the only thing Mason Cross understood.
Six months earlier, the Graysons had summoned me home after nearly two years of little contact.
My adoptive father had sat behind his desk without meeting my eyes.
My adoptive mother had cried into a handkerchief.
