Riley had stood by the window.
The Cross family had approached them about an old agreement between the families, one involving a marriage intended to settle business obligations and preserve a partnership neither side wanted publicly disputed.
Riley was supposed to be the bride.
She refused.
Not privately.
Not gently.
She had spent days repeating every rumor she had ever heard about Mason Cross.
That his father had died under strange circumstances.
That his mother had died young.
That women around the Cross family disappeared from society.
That the Cross mansion was cursed.
Then she had said the sentence that finally drove me out of the Grayson house forever.
“Send Tessa.
She isn’t really ours anyway.”
My parents had not defended me.
They had asked whether I would consider it.
I had said yes for one reason: I wanted the debt they claimed I owed them to end.
Mason had surprised me from the beginning.
He was cold, certainly.
Controlled.
Difficult to read.
But he had never once threatened me.
He gave me my own rooms, my own bank account, access to medical care, and the freedom to leave whenever I wanted.
When we discovered I was pregnant with triplets after a marriage that had gradually become far less fictional than either of us admitted, his protectiveness had intensified.
What had not changed was my insistence that the company not know who I was.
I wanted one thing that had not been handed to me because of a family name.
Mason had reluctantly agreed.
Now that decision had placed me in the center of a marble lobby with a handprint on my face.
Rocco touched an earpiece.
“The floor is secure.”
Mason glanced at him.
“Conference room.”
Riley folded her arms.
“I’m not going anywhere with you.”
“You ordered company security to detain an employee,” Mason said.
“You accused her of theft without verifying ownership.
You physically assaulted her.
And you ordered staff to call police using my company’s authority.”
“She had stolen property.”
“No,” Eleanor said.
“She had my property because I wanted her to have it.”
Riley pointed at me.
“How was I supposed to know?”
“You could have asked,” I said.
Her eyes snapped toward me.
“You always have an answer now, don’t you?”
“No.
I just stopped being afraid of yours.”
That hurt her more than shouting would have.
Mason handed the document back to Rocco.
“Take statements from everyone who witnessed the incident.
Preserve the lobby recordings.
Nobody deletes anything.”
Riley’s confidence cracked further.
“You’re making this into something it isn’t.”
Rocco’s expression remained neutral.
