I Left the Masquerade Pregnant

Chapter 23

The elevator deposits me in the hotel lobby at 5:47 a.m., and Rhys insists on walking me to the car he's called.

His hand rests on the small of my back, warm and proprietary, and when I glance up at his face, there's something in his expression I can't quite name.

A flicker at the corner of his mouth. The ghost of a smile that doesn't match the concern in his voice.

"Are you sure you don't want me to come with you? You shouldn't have to face this alone."

"I need to get home to Milo."

"Of course." He kisses my forehead, lingering. "Call me when you're ready to talk. I'm here for you, Elara. Whatever you need."

That almost-smile again. Like he's won something.

You're being paranoid. He's trying to be supportive.

I brush it off and slide into the car.

By the time I walk through my apartment door, Caspian's face is rotating across every news channel like a slot machine that keeps landing on disaster.

BREAKING: Voss Global CEO Arrested on Embezzlement Charges. Sources Allege Millions Missing.

I stand in my kitchen with Milo fussing against my shoulder, watching my husband's mugshot cycle through CNN, MSNBC, Fox, like some kind of coordinated character assassination.

He looks exhausted. Defeated. Nothing like the ice sculpture I married.

My phone buzzes.

Tessa: Three of Dad's new clients called. Threatening to pull accounts unless we publicly distance from anything Voss-related. I'm so sorry, E.

I read it twice before the implications sink in. The clients Rhys brought in. The ones he personally arranged to save Tessa's father's firm.

Coincidence. It's just a coincidence.

My phone rings. Unknown number. Every instinct screams to let it go to voicemail, but my thumb has other ideas.

"Elara."

Caspian's voice comes through stripped raw, nothing like the controlled baritone I've spent three years learning to resent.

"Please don't hang up. I know I have no right to ask anything of you, but I'm begging you to listen."

"This isn't your number."

"Burner phone. My lawyers are paranoid about surveillance, recordings leaked to the press. Everything I say gets twisted into evidence." A shaky breath. "I know I handled this wrong. The custody papers, the silence, all of it. But I need you to know—I didn't do this. The embezzlement is fabricated. Someone is framing me."

I almost laugh.

"Caspian, do you hear yourself? You're facing federal charges and suddenly you're the innocent victim of a shadowy conspiracy? That's convenient."

"I know how it sounds. I know you have no reason to believe me."

His voice cracks on something that sounds terrifyingly like desperation.

"But I've been investigating Rhys since the day I saw you kiss him in that car. Something is wrong with him, Elara. I just can't prove it yet."

The floor tilts beneath my feet.

"You've been investigating Rhys? Your cousin who actually shows up while you're outsourcing our marriage to attorneys?"

"He's not showing up for you. He's positioning himself."

Caspian's words tumble out faster now, urgent.

"Everything he does is calculated—finding your apartment, arranging those clients for Tessa's firm, making himself indispensable. I was fighting for you, Elara. I was trying to protect you from someone I knew was dangerous."

The words hit like a physical blow.

"You don't get to do that."

My voice comes out sharp enough to cut glass.

"You don't get to disappear into your fortress of silence, send custody papers like I'm a failed acquisition, and then claim you were secretly protecting me the whole time. That's not how marriage works."

"I handled it wrong. I know."

He sounds like a man watching his last lifeboat drift away.

"But think about the timing, Elara. Everything since the masquerade. Every crisis, every revelation, every moment designed to push you away from me and toward him."

"Or maybe you're the one calculating right now. The empire is crumbling, so you point fingers at the convenient scapegoat."

I'm pacing, Milo squirming against my shoulder.

"Rhys has been honest with me. He told me about his mother, the exile, watching his family abandon him. He's shown me more vulnerability in weeks than you managed in three years."

"Vulnerability can be a weapon. The right story, told the right way, makes anyone look like the victim."

"Like you're doing right now?"

Silence. Heavy. Suffocating.

"I deserve that. I deserve every bit of your suspicion. But I'm asking you to consider the possibility that the man who seduced you at a masked ball—pretending to be your husband—might not have your best interests at heart."

The line goes dead.

I stand in my kitchen surrounded by the wreckage of two lives I don't know how to choose between.

My lists spread across the counter like evidence at a crime scene. Margaret Wilson's sudden betrayal. The Singapore incident Rhys somehow knew about. The seating arrangement at Le Bernardin. The masquerade invitation with that nickname that Caspian only ever used in private.

Except once.

At our wedding toast. In front of two hundred guests.

Possibly including Rhys.

Stop it. Caspian is manipulating you. He's scared and desperate and turning you against the one person who actually showed up.

But I keep seeing Rhys's face in that hotel room. The flicker of satisfaction when the headlines broke. The way nothing about the scandal seemed to surprise him.

Coincidence. It has to be a coincidence.

I dial Tessa before I can talk myself out of it.

"Elara? Thank God, I've been calling all morning. Are you okay? They're saying Caspian might face actual prison time, and I don't know what this means for you and Milo, and my dad's clients are threatening to bolt, and everything is just—"

"Tessa. I need you to do something for me. Don't ask why."

"That's never a good opening."

"I need everything you can find about Rhys Voss's years in Switzerland. School records, financial transactions, every person he contacted during the exile." My hand trembles against the phone. "I'm not saying Rhys is guilty of anything. I just need to know for myself."

"What happened?"

"Caspian told me a story that's probably complete bullshit." I force my voice steady. "But I can't stop thinking about it."

"I'll make calls. Dad knows people who know people, and if there's dirt, we'll find it."

She pauses, and when she speaks again, her voice is careful.

"But Elara? Be careful. Whoever's telling the truth, you're standing in the middle of a war between two very powerful men. And wars destroy the people caught in the crossfire."

I hang up and stare at my reflection in the darkened screen.

Please let Caspian be lying. Please let this be jealousy and desperation and nothing more.