Attendance Is Expected
Three words sat at the bottom like a commandment rather than a courtesy.
She turned the envelope over, half-expecting a personal note, some acknowledgment that this was no longer merely corporate theater but the reshaping of her life. There was nothing else.
Ethan was waiting in the sitting room when she emerged dressed in a slate-grey suit. He stood by the window as though guarding it from the city beyond rather than her.
“This is public,” she said, holding up the envelope.
“Yes,” he replied.
“And Lydia will be there.”
“Yes.”
A pause followed. Then she asked the question she already knew the answer to.
“Are you accompanying me?”
“I will be present,” he said.
Not with you.
Just present.
The dining hall reserved for board functions occupied the highest floor of the Grantstone tower. Light flooded the room through wall-to-wall windows, the skyline reflected in the polished marble like a second city suspended beneath their feet. The directors were already gathered when Isabella entered, their conversations soft and measured, their smiles rehearsed.
What unsettled her was not that they turned to look.
It was that they did not look at her.