“Family is a messy business,” Chloe smirked. She abruptly pivoted and marched toward the wet bar—my private bar, stocked with single malts that predated her birth. She wrapped her fingers around a heavy crystal decanter. “You don’t mind, do you? The train station was incredibly dusty.”
Without waiting for permission, she tipped the heavy crystal and poured herself a vulgar three fingers of my thirty-year-old Macallan.
I glanced at my husband. Mark was practically vibrating with panic, his knuckles white as he gripped the edge of the archway.
“Chloe, perhaps some sparkling water would be better?” Mark choked out, a pathetic plea thinly disguised as a suggestion.
“Oh, relax, Marky,” she giggled, taking a massive, unappreciative swallow of the scotch. “Your wife knows how to share, right, Elena?”
As she moved, the ambient air currents of the penthouse carried her scent directly to me. A heavy, cloying fog of synthetic vanilla and aggressive jasmine. My stomach contracted violently.
It was the exact same cheap perfume I had smelled lingering on Mark’s collar three days ago when I gathered his dry cleaning. The exact same scent that clung to his skin when he crawled into bed at 2:00 a.m. after a supposedly grueling “client acquisition dinner.”
I smiled. It was a terrifying, razor-thin expression that involved only my teeth.
“I share what I choose to share,” I murmured softly. “Please, make yourself comfortable. But do be cautious. Many things in this home are remarkably fragile. And irreplaceably expensive.”
Chloe scoffed, stepping closer. She deliberately brushed her shoulder against mine, invading my personal space. She leaned in, the stench of jasmine and alcohol overwhelming, and whispered a secret meant only for the two of us.
