CHAPTER 8: NOW TELL ME WHAT YOU DID

Richard finally faced Ethan fully.
"Now tell me what you did to my daughter."
The sentence did not boom.
It did not need to.
Ethan's eyes moved from Richard to the guards to Isabelle, searching for the weakest place in the circle. There was none.
"I made a mistake," he said.
Isabelle's breath caught, but she held herself steady.
"A mistake is spilling wine," she said. "A mistake is forgetting a name. You followed me into a corridor, trapped me against a wall, hit me, and told me no one would believe me."
Ethan's mouth opened.
Richard stepped forward one pace.
"Close it."
For once, Ethan obeyed.
Police lights flashed outside the ballroom windows, soft and distant through the curtains. Someone had called before the doors were locked. Richard had not come only to frighten him. He had come to keep him from leaving before the law arrived.
Isabelle looked at her father then.
Not as a child asking to be saved.
As a woman allowing him to stand beside her.
Richard's voice softened only for her.
"I should have been easier to call before tonight."
Isabelle swallowed.
"But you came."