Chapter 2
The next morning, I returned to the Upper East Side townhouse.
I hadn’t come to ask Evander why he had betrayed me.
I only wanted the blue leather design book my mother had left behind.
The dining room smelled of coffee.
Sabine was wearing my white robe, seated where I ate breakfast every morning. My mother’s blue-rimmed coffee cup sat beside her hand.
When she saw me, her fingers curled protectively around it.
As if she thought I might take it.
Evander stood by the window with a cup of black coffee.
“Make a list,” he said. “The housekeeper will send your things over.”
He set a ring of keys on the dining table.
My keys.
“Leave them. Sabine will be moving into the master suite.”
I looked at the keys but didn’t touch them.
“Where is the blue design book?”
Sabine’s hand stilled against the rim of her cup.
Evander frowned.
“Those materials belong in the company archives.”
“They belonged to my mother.”
“Your mother left them to you.” He looked at me. “And you married into Harrowmont.”
He said it as if the transfer of ownership were the most natural thing in the world.
I walked past him and went upstairs.
The studio door was unlocked.
The blue leather design book sat in the bottom drawer, beneath an old photograph of my mother and me.
I sat on the carpet and opened it.
On the first page was a pair of tide-inspired earrings I had designed the year Evander and I married. Back then, he had held me and promised that once the brand found its footing, my name would stand beside every piece I created.
On the sixth page was the winter after my mother died. I hadn’t slept all night when I drew a bird spreading its wings. It later became Harrowmont’s best-selling brooch.
On the twelfth page was last spring’s crown. At the launch, Sabine stood in front of the cameras and said it had made her “rethink feminine power.”
In the corner of every page was a tiny flying-bird mark.
And on none of them was the name Aveline.
At the back of the book, I found a draft of the anniversary press release tucked between the pages.
Sabine’s name was printed at the top.
The rebirth of Maris’s Star, led by Sabine Harrowmont.
Footsteps sounded downstairs.
Evander stood in the doorway.
“You can’t take that.”
I closed the book.
“You’ve already taken twelve years.”
He stepped closer.
“Aveline, don’t turn the signature into revenge. Leaving the diamond in a vault does no one any good.”
Sabine appeared behind him, holding the authorization form.
“If you sign,” she said quietly, “everything can stay civilized.”
I looked at her.
“It belonged to my mother.”
“It’s our future now,” she said.
I smiled once.
“No.”
I took the authorization form from her hand and tore it in half in front of them.
“I’m not signing.”
Evander’s face finally darkened.
“You’ll come back.”
I picked up the design book and walked past him.
The keys remained on the dining table.
“No,” I said.
“This time, you’ll come looking for me.”