She did not need to.
She could make a room colder simply by entering it.
The first time I had dinner in the Sterling dining room, I wore a navy dress I had saved two paychecks to buy.
I remember sitting at the long polished table under a chandelier that looked like frozen rain, trying not to stare at the silverware lined in unfamiliar ranks beside my plate.
Victoria watched me for nearly ten minutes before she spoke.
“Tell me, Sophia,” she said, touching the rim of her wineglass, “what exactly do your parents do?”
“My mother was a nurse,” I said.
“My father drove trucks before he passed.”
“How resilient,” she replied.
It sounded like praise until everyone at the table looked down.
Later that night, when Michael walked me to the car, I told him his mother hated me.
“She’s just protective,” he said.
