"The Berlin expansion requires board approval before we can proceed, and I'm seeing hesitation from several members who weren't present at the preliminary discussions."
Rachel's voice drifts across the boardroom while I force my attention toward the presentation slides.
Twelve board members sit around the mahogany table, and Iolanthe watches from her customary seat with predatory stillness.
My phone buzzes against my thigh. I ignore it. It buzzes again, then a third time.
I slip the device from my pocket beneath the table.
Unknown number. Words that turn my blood to ice.
Congratulations on the wedding. I'm sure Elowen will make a lovely bride—for whoever actually gets to keep her.
"Ms. Cross?" Rachel's voice cuts through the fog. "Did you want to add anything regarding the timeline projections?"
"The projections are sufficient. Continue with the regulatory analysis, and I need to step out briefly for an urgent matter."
The boardroom door clicks shut behind me, and I dial Maren Cole before I've finished crossing the executive hallway.
"Ms. Cross, I wasn't expecting to hear from you during business hours," she answers on the second ring. "Is everything alright?"
"I need you to trace a message immediately. Unknown number, received approximately ninety seconds ago. Someone sent a threatening text about Elowen Kincaid, and I need to know who has access to information about our association."
"Send me the number and the message content right now. I'll run it through my contacts immediately, but you should know that sophisticated actors often use burner devices specifically because they're difficult to trace."
"Difficult isn't impossible, Maren. You've found impossible things before, and I'm willing to pay whatever premium makes this your top priority."
"Understood completely. Give me an hour, and I'll call you back with whatever I find. In the meantime, don't respond to any further messages from that number, and document everything that comes through."
"Fine. One hour, Maren. Not a minute longer."
The line goes dead, and I stare at my phone screen while the message glows accusingly—whoever actually gets to keep her.
I dial Elowen's number. It rings four times and drops to voicemail.
I dial again. Same result. A third time, and the recorded greeting sounds like mockery.
The hour crawls past in agonizing increments. I return to the boardroom long enough to conclude the presentation, deflecting Iolanthe's probing questions with practiced neutrality.
When Maren finally calls back, I've worn a path in my office carpet.
"The news isn't good," she says without preamble. "Burner phone, purchased with cash three days ago from a convenience store in upstate New York. No security footage worth examining, no credit card trail, no identifying information whatsoever."
"Someone planned this carefully, then. What else did you find?"
"Here's what concerns me more, Ms. Cross. I ran additional inquiries through my network, and it seems someone has been asking questions about you and Miss Kincaid specifically. Your dining patterns, your travel schedules, the frequency of your visits to Vermont."
"Who's asking these questions? I need names, Maren."
"That's what I can't determine yet. The inquiries came through intermediaries, shell accounts, the kind of layered anonymity that costs real money to construct. This isn't amateur surveillance, Ms. Cross. Someone with significant resources has decided your relationship with Elowen Kincaid deserves scrutiny."
"Keep digging. Whatever it costs, whatever favors you need to call in, I need to know who's behind this before they make their next move."
"I'll do what I can, but you should prepare for the possibility that this person doesn't want to be found. And Ms. Cross? You should consider very carefully who benefits from exposing whatever they think they've discovered."
The call ends, and I'm already reaching for my keys.
Four hours of highway blur past in a haze of white knuckles and spiraling dread.
I call Elowen six more times during the drive—each unanswered ring tightening the vice around my chest.
The Kincaid estate emerges from the Vermont hills as the sun begins its descent, and I pull into the circular drive with none of the discretion previous visits required.
Reginald sits in the front parlor when the housekeeper admits me, his newspaper spread across his lap like a shield against unwanted intrusion.
"Ms. Armitage, what an unexpected visit." He barely glances up. "I wasn't aware you had business at our estate this evening."
"Where is Elowen? I've been trying to reach her for hours, and she hasn't answered any of my calls."
"She went out with a college friend."
He turns a page with deliberate disinterest.
"I don't monitor my daughter's movements, Ms. Armitage. She's a grown woman, perfectly capable of managing her own social calendar."
"Which friend? Where did they go? This is important, Mr. Kincaid."
"I didn't ask, and she didn't volunteer the information."
His gaze finally lifts to meet mine.
"Is there a reason you're so concerned about Elowen's whereabouts? I was under the impression that wedding planning fell to the bride and groom, not the groom's sister."
"I have documents that require her signature. Time-sensitive trust provisions that can't wait until tomorrow. If you hear from her, please ask her to contact me immediately."
"Of course." He returns to his newspaper with obvious dismissal. "I'm sure she'll turn up eventually. She always does."
I retreat to my car and sit in the driver's seat, staring at my phone while the last light drains from the sky.
It buzzes in my hand.
Unknown number. A photograph this time—Elowen sitting at a bar in Burlington, her head thrown back in laughter, a dark-haired woman leaning close enough that their shoulders touch.
The woman's face is half-turned from the camera, but there's an intimacy in their posture that makes my vision blur with jealousy so acute it tastes like blood.
The caption appears beneath the image: Old flames die hard.
I stare at the photograph until my eyes burn. Elowen's smile is genuine—the kind she rarely shows in public, the kind I thought belonged only to moments we shared in private.
Her name was Margot, she told me in the library. She left two weeks before commencement, no explanation, no goodbye.
Dark hair. A college connection. A woman who once knew Elowen well enough to break her heart.
Someone knows exactly how to weaponize my heart—every vulnerability, every jealousy, every desperate fear I've spent thirty-two years learning to suppress.
They know that showing me Elowen laughing with another woman would unravel me faster than any business threat.
And they're right.
My hands tremble around the phone as I realize that whoever is watching us understands something I've only begun to admit: I would burn down everything I've built before I let someone take her from me.
Which makes me the perfect target.