Cassidy held the tiny white sock between her fingers and tried not to smile too much.

It was ridiculous, really. The sock was barely bigger than her palm. Soft cotton. A pale yellow duck stitched badly near the ankle, one eye larger than the other. She had bought it that morning from a small baby shop tucked between a dry cleaner and a florist, the kind of place Diane Morrison would have called “provincial” even though the socks cost more than most people’s dinners.

Cassidy bought two pairs.

One yellow.

One cream.

She folded them into tissue paper herself before the clerk could reach for the box.

At seven months pregnant, bending over the nursery drawer took effort. She moved carefully, one hand on the curve of her belly, the other sliding the socks into the top row beside washed onesies and tiny mittens with no thumbs.

“Your grandmother would hate these,” she said.

The baby moved.

Cassidy looked down.

“Exactly.”

The nursery was almost finished.

She liked imperfect things.

They stayed honest.

Her phone buzzed on the dresser.

For a second, she thought it might be Arthur from legal. Arthur never called without a reason. Not since the divorce filings, not since the board had started asking why the Morrison family remained on payroll despite internal audits that made even senior finance officers look away from the spreadsheets.

But the screen showed Brendan.

Cassidy let it ring twice before answering.

“Yes?”

“You’re still coming tonight, right?”

No greeting.

No asking how she felt.

No

Cassidy closed the nursery drawer with her hip. “You told me your mother wanted to discuss the final property documents.”

“She does.”

“Then I’ll come.”

A pause came through the line. She heard a car door shut on his end, then his voice lowered.

“Try not to make it awkward.”

Cassidy looked at the crib.

“Awkward for whom?”

“For everyone.” Brendan exhaled. “Jessica will be there.”

There it was.

A small blade, slipped under the ribs without raising the hand.

Cassidy walked to the window. Outside, late afternoon light touched the tops of the maple trees along the driveway of the townhouse she had bought under an LLC years before Brendan understood what an LLC could hide. Her reflection in the glass looked pale, tired, composed. All the things people mistook for harmless.

“You invited your girlfriend to a legal discussion with your pregnant ex-wife?”

“She

“She lives in your mother’s house.”

“It’s still family property.”

Cassidy almost laughed.

Family property.

The Morrison family loved phrases like that. They used them the way old churches used stained glass. Pretty from a distance. Useful for hiding what was really inside.

“Cassidy.”

“I heard you.”

“I mean it. No scenes.”

She rested a hand against the window frame.

“No scenes.”

Brendan hung up first.

He always did when he wanted to feel like the person who had ended something.

Cassidy placed the phone face down on the dresser and stood there until the baby shifted again. Then she crossed the room, took the tiny yellow socks back out of the drawer, and tucked them into her handbag.

She did not know why.

Not exactly.

Some things women do before war are too small to explain.

The Morrison mansion sat on a gated hill outside Greenwich, set behind iron fencing and an absurd line of trimmed hedges that looked frightened of growing in the wrong direction. Every window glowed by the time Cassidy arrived. Warm. Golden. Inviting, if a person did not know the people inside.

The guard at the gate recognized her but still checked the guest list.

That was new.

Cassidy watched his eyes flick once toward the house, then back to her. He looked embarrassed.

“You’re on it, Mrs. Morrison.”

She did not correct him.

The divorce had been signed three months earlier, but people like the Morrisons stayed attached to names the way they stayed attached to assets: only when useful.

Inside, the foyer smelled of lilies and furniture polish. A crystal chandelier spilled light over the marble floor. Someone had placed a silver bowl of white roses on the entry table, all cut at the exact same height.

Diane’s work.

Diane Morrison believed flowers, servants, and daughters-in-law should never lean in different directions.

Cassidy handed her coat to a maid she remembered from last winter.

“Thank you, Elena.”

The woman’s face softened for half a second.

“You look well, ma’am.”

“Liar.”

Elena looked down quickly, but a tiny smile appeared.

Then footsteps came from the hall.

Jessica arrived first.

She wore emerald silk and diamond earrings that brushed her jaw every time she moved. Twenty-six, maybe. Beautiful in the expensive way. Smooth hair, perfect posture, a smile that had learned which rooms rewarded cruelty if it came wrapped in softness.

“Cassidy,” Jessica said. “You made it.”

“Yes.”

Jessica’s eyes lowered to Cassidy’s stomach.

Just for a second.

Not long enough to accuse.

Long enough to notice.

“Brendan was worried you’d cancel.”

“No, he wasn’t.”

The smile changed.

A tiny crack.

Then Brendan entered behind her, and the room seemed to arrange itself around him because that was what the Morrison house had trained everyone to do.

He looked good. That was the annoying part. Dark suit, open collar, hair pushed back in the careless way that took forty minutes and a stylist to achieve. He had lost some weight since the divorce. Or maybe arrogance just wore sharper on him now.

His gaze touched Cassidy’s cream maternity dress.

Simple. Elegant. Loose enough to be comfortable.

Not cheap.

Not obvious.

He frowned anyway.

“Dinner’s already started.”

“You said seven.”

“It’s seven fifteen.”

“The gate stopped me.”

He glanced toward Elena.

Elena lowered her head.

There it was again. The tiny cruelty. The way power moved without raising its voice.

Cassidy removed her gloves one finger at a time.

“Then we should go in.”

The dining room had always been Diane’s stage.

Long glass table. High-backed chairs. White linen. Crystal. Tall candles. A dark Persian rug beneath it all, imported after Diane claimed the previous one looked “too corporate.” Cassidy remembered approving the headquarters renovation budget three years ago and seeing an almost identical rug listed under executive hospitality décor.

Diane had taste.

Diane also had access to company vendors she was never supposed to use.

Cassidy had noticed.

Cassidy had noticed everything.

Diane sat at the head of the table in a black dress with pearls at her throat. Her hair was swept up, her makeup perfect, her expression already disappointed before Cassidy even reached the chair.

“Cassidy,” Diane said. “How brave of you to come.”

Cassidy lowered herself carefully into the chair at the far end, the one closest to the service entrance.

Not a mistake.

A message.

“Diane.”

Brendan sat near his mother. Jessica beside him. Two cousins were present too, both on inflated salaries at Remora Global, both suddenly fascinated by their soup spoons when Cassidy looked their way.

They all worked there.

Every single person at that table drew money from the empire Cassidy had built before she married Brendan, before Diane decided Cassidy’s quietness meant she had no leverage, before Jessica learned to giggle at another woman’s humiliation.

Remora Global Holdings.

A multi-billion dollar private logistics, infrastructure, and energy services company operating across twelve countries. Cassidy had founded it under her mother’s maiden name at twenty-four, back when investors called her “aggressive” because they did not like saying “right.” She kept control through layered trusts, holding companies, and a board structure Arthur had once described as “legal architecture with teeth.”

Brendan knew she was successful when they married.

He did not know the scale.

Diane knew nothing.

Jessica knew even less.

That had been the point at first. Privacy. Protection. A marriage untouched by money.

Then marriage became something else.

Then privacy became a weapon used against her.

Diane lifted her wine glass.

“To new beginnings,” she said.

Jessica smiled.

Brendan touched his glass to hers.

Cassidy reached for water.

Nobody toasted the baby.

The soup was served in porcelain bowls with thin gold rims. Cassidy took three spoonfuls, then stopped. Not because it tasted bad. Because Diane was watching her eat with a look that made food feel like evidence.

“You’re still living in that little place?” Diane asked.

“It has four bedrooms.”

“For now.”

One cousin coughed into his napkin.

Jessica looked at Brendan.

Brendan did not look at Cassidy.

The baby moved under her ribs. Cassidy placed her palm there beneath the table.

Diane leaned back. “We did discuss whether tonight was appropriate, given your condition.”

“My condition?”

“Pregnancy can make women unstable.”

Cassidy set her spoon down.

One sound.

Small.

Diane’s eyes flicked to it.

Brendan sighed. “Mom.”

Not a defense.

A warning to keep the dinner smooth.

Diane waved one hand. “I’m only saying what everyone is thinking.”

“No,” Cassidy said. “You’re saying what you’re thinking.”

Jessica laughed softly, then covered it by reaching for wine.

Brendan’s jaw tightened. “Let’s not start.”

Cassidy looked at him then.

“Start what?”

He held her gaze for a second too long, then broke it.

That was new too.

He used to meet her eyes when he lied.

Now he looked away.

The next course arrived. Diane praised Jessica’s dress. Jessica praised Diane’s house. Brendan praised himself by mentioning a client acquisition that had nothing to do with him and everything to do with a strategy Cassidy had approved eighteen months ago.

“Big move for us,” Brendan said.

“For you?” Cassidy asked.

His fork paused.

Diane smiled into her glass.

“Brendan has been invaluable at Remora.”

“In what department?”

A cousin went very still.

Brendan’s eyes sharpened. “Operations.”

“Which division?”

“North Atlantic.”

“Interesting.”

Jessica looked between them. “Why is that interesting?”

Cassidy cut a piece of roasted carrot. “No reason.”

Brendan’s hand tightened around his fork.

He knew just enough to be nervous when she asked specific questions. Not enough to understand why.

Diane changed the subject with the graceful violence of a woman moving a knife from one hand to the other.

“The lawyer sent revised documents this morning,” she said. “There’s a small adjustment.”

Cassidy chewed once. Swallowed.

“What adjustment?”

“The family believes it would be best if you waived future claims connected to Brendan’s executive compensation.”

Cassidy looked at Brendan.

He looked back now.

“You mean support.”

“I mean unnecessary entanglement,” Diane said.

Cassidy wiped the corner of her mouth with the napkin.

“I’m pregnant with his child.”

“That remains to be handled separately.”

The room quieted.

Even Jessica stopped smiling for a moment.

Cassidy folded the napkin in her lap.

“Handled?”

Diane’s face stayed pleasant. “Don’t make it vulgar.”

Cassidy looked down at her hand resting over her stomach. A tiny hard movement pushed back against her palm.

There you are.

Brendan reached for his wine. “We’ll take care of what’s required.”

Required.

Not loved.

Not protected.

Required.

Cassidy lifted her glass of water and drank slowly.

Diane mistook the silence for weakness. She always did. The woman had never understood that silence could be a locked door, not an empty room.

Jessica leaned closer to Brendan and whispered something.

Cassidy heard only one word.

Burden.

There was a moment, very brief, when the dining room became clear in pieces.

Brendan’s thumb sliding over Jessica’s knuckles.

Diane’s pearl necklace resting against her throat.

A candle leaning to one side.

The wet shine of sauce on a silver knife.

Cassidy placed her water glass down exactly where it had been.

No closer.

No farther.

Diane stood.

The servants looked up.

Not all of them. Just enough.

Diane moved toward the sideboard, where a metal bucket sat half-hidden beside a floral arrangement. Cassidy recognized it from the entry hall. The staff used it near the winter mats.

Dirty water.

Melted ice.

Floor grit.

Cassidy watched Diane pick it up.

Brendan did too.

He did not stop her.

That was the final answer.

Diane came around the table with the bucket in both hands, smiling as if she had just thought of something witty rather than something unforgivable.

“Look on the bright side,” she said.

Cassidy turned her head.

The water hit before Diane finished smiling.

It was so cold Cassidy’s body locked around the shock. It poured over her hair, her face, her shoulders, into the neckline of her dress, down her back, over the curve of her belly. The dirty smell of mop water and old stone filled her nose. Her hand flew to her stomach before she could stop it.

The baby kicked hard.

Once.

Then again.

Water struck the glass table and scattered across white linen. It ran from her sleeves onto the Persian rug in dark spreading marks. A drop slid from her lashes and fell onto her wrist.

No one spoke.

Then Brendan laughed.

A loud, open sound.

Jessica followed, smaller but real.

Diane lowered the bucket beside Cassidy’s chair, satisfied. “At least you finally took a bath.”

The candlelight blurred through the water on Cassidy’s lashes.

She blinked once.

Twice.

The cold moved through her clothes and into her bones, but something inside her went the opposite direction.

Still.

Clear.

Almost quiet.

Jessica looked at Cassidy’s soaked shoes. “Someone bring her an old towel. We don’t want that smell on the expensive linen.”

A servant stepped forward.

Cassidy raised one wet hand.

The servant stopped.

Diane returned to her seat and poured more wine, her hand steady from practice. Brendan leaned back, grinning like a boy who had watched a window break and knew he would not be blamed.

“Cass,” he said. “Don’t make this worse.”

She looked at him.

“Worse?”

His smile twitched.

Diane lifted her glass. “Give her twenty dollars for a cab and make her disappear.”

Cassidy reached into her handbag.

Water had gotten inside. The lining was soaked. The tissue paper around the tiny yellow socks clung to her fingers when she touched it.

For half a second, that nearly undid her.

Not Diane.

Not Brendan.

The socks.

She moved past them and found the phone.

Brendan noticed.

“Oh, come on. Who are you calling? A charity? It’s Sunday.”

Cassidy unlocked the screen.

Jessica laughed again. “Maybe a shelter.”

Cassidy scrolled to Arthur’s contact.

Arthur Vale had been Remora’s Executive Vice President of Legal for nine years. He had gray hair, three phones, no visible sense of humor, and the rare corporate gift of understanding exactly when a line had been crossed. He had drafted Protocol 7 after Cassidy’s second miscarriage scare during her marriage, when she began to understand that the Morrison family did not merely dislike her.

They would strip her bare if they ever learned what she owned.

So she prepared.

Not for revenge.

For containment.

Arthur answered on the first ring.

“Cassidy?” he said. “Are you alright?”

The use of her first name changed something in the room. Not because they heard love in it. Because they heard rank.

Cassidy placed the phone on speaker and set it on the glass table.

Water dripped from her hair beside it.

“No,” she said. “Execute Protocol 7. Now.”

Arthur did not answer immediately.

Brendan frowned.

Diane’s glass stopped halfway to her mouth.

Jessica mouthed something, but no sound came out.

Arthur spoke carefully. “Cassidy, if I activate it, the Morrisons could lose everything.”

Brendan stood.

His chair scraped so hard against the marble that Jessica flinched.

“What the hell does that mean?”

Cassidy kept her eyes on him.

“They already lost it,” she said.

Arthur exhaled once through the phone. “Confirm full authority.”

“Confirmed.”

“Immediate effective date?”

“Now.”

“Cassidy—”

“Make it effective.”

That was all.

She ended the call.

For two seconds, nobody moved.

Then Brendan laughed again, but this time the sound came out wrong. Too short. Too dry.

“Protocol 7?” he said. “What is that, some divorce drama? You think a lawyer can scare us in my mother’s dining room?”

Cassidy reached for the tiny yellow socks inside her bag and closed her fingers around them where no one could see.

Outside, a car braked hard.

Then another.

Headlights swept across the tall dining room windows, bright white across Diane’s pearls, Brendan’s face, Jessica’s bare shoulder.

The front door opened.

Not a polite opening.

A controlled one.

Heavy footsteps crossed the marble foyer.

Brendan turned toward the sound.

Diane’s face changed by one degree. That was all. But Cassidy saw it. Diane Morrison had spent her life recognizing authority by the way it entered rooms.

A man in a dark security suit appeared in the dining room doorway. Behind him stood two more. Not Brendan’s private security. Not the house staff. Remora Global corporate protection detail.

The first man looked past Brendan.

Past Diane.

Past Jessica.

Straight to Cassidy.

“Ms. Vale-Marlowe,” he said. “We have secured the perimeter.”

Jessica’s lips parted.

Brendan stared at the man, then at Cassidy.

“Ms. what?”

Cassidy slowly pushed herself up from the chair. The wet dress clung to her, heavy and cold. Her knees protested. Her back ached. One hand stayed on her belly; the other gripped the edge of the table.

No one offered help.

Good.

She did not want their hands near her.

The security officer stepped forward, but she gave the smallest shake of her head.

He stopped.

Arthur entered next.

He must have been nearby already. Of course he had. Protocol 7 required proximity once the board flagged risk. Cassidy had known that in theory. Seeing him in Diane’s dining room, holding a black folder sealed with Remora’s legal insignia, made the theory feel like steel.

Arthur did not look at the water first.

He looked at Cassidy’s face.

Then her stomach.

Then the bucket.

His jaw hardened.

“Mrs. Morrison,” he said to Diane, though his voice held no respect. “Mr. Morrison. Ms. Hale.”

Jessica whispered, “Brendan?”

Brendan ignored her.

Arthur opened the folder.

“As of seven forty-two p.m. tonight, by direct order of the controlling owner of Remora Global Holdings and its associated entities, Protocol 7 has been activated.”

Diane stood.

“Controlling owner?”

Arthur continued.

“All Morrison family members, affiliates, and related-party contractors are suspended pending immediate forensic review. Corporate cards are frozen. Executive access has been revoked. Pending compensation, bonuses, housing allowances, discretionary reimbursements, and vendor-linked privileges are halted until review is complete.”

One cousin made a small sound.

The other pulled out his phone.

It did not unlock.

Arthur glanced at him. “Company devices are locked.”

Brendan stepped toward Cassidy. “You can’t do this.”

Cassidy looked at his shoes. Polished. Italian. Charged to a corporate account under executive wardrobe expenses.

“I already did.”

“You don’t own Remora.”

Arthur turned one page in the folder.

“Yes,” he said. “She does.”

The room received that sentence unevenly.

Jessica first.

Her face went blank, then sharp, then frightened in the practical way of someone recalculating what she had attached herself to.

One cousin sat down without meaning to.

Diane remained standing, but her fingers gripped the back of her chair so tightly her knuckles blanched beneath the rings.

Brendan stared at Cassidy.

“No.”

Cassidy said nothing.

Arthur placed a document on the glass table. It landed beside a puddle from Cassidy’s dress.

“Cassidy Vale-Marlowe is the founder, principal beneficiary, and controlling authority of Remora Global Holdings through Marlowe Trust and its related ownership structures. Your employment was retained at her discretion. Your family’s compensation packages were retained at her discretion. This residence’s corporate maintenance contract was retained at her discretion.”

Diane’s eyes flicked toward the ceiling.

The chandelier.

The flowers.

The linen.

The rug.

Cassidy saw the count happen behind her eyes.

Item by item.

Luxury by luxury.

“Cassidy,” Brendan said.

Her name sounded different now.

Smaller in his mouth.

He took one step closer. “Why didn’t you tell me?”

That almost made her smile.

Not because it was funny.

Because he still thought the secret was the betrayal.

“You laughed,” she said.

He blinked.

She gestured once toward the bucket. “When your mother poured dirty water on your pregnant child’s mother, you laughed.”

Brendan looked toward Diane, then back to Cassidy.

“Cass, I didn’t know she was going to—”

“You watched her pick up the bucket.”

His mouth stayed open.

No words came.

Diane recovered first. Women like Diane always did. Shame passed through her body quickly, rejected like a foreign organ.

“This is absurd,” she said. “You hid assets during the marriage.”

Arthur looked at her. “No marital assets were hidden. Brendan signed a prenuptial agreement acknowledging separate pre-existing holdings and waiving discovery beyond disclosed personal accounts. He declined independent counsel.”

Brendan’s face reddened.

Cassidy remembered that day. He had waved the document away after three pages.

“I trust you,” he had said.

Then kissed her forehead.

Then asked if dinner was ready.

Arthur pulled another paper free.

“Additionally, legal has compiled eight years of related-party compensation irregularities, vendor manipulation, unauthorized corporate benefits, misuse of company travel, and expense fraud attached to Morrison family personnel.”

One cousin stood. “I didn’t—”

Arthur looked at him.

He sat down.

Diane’s voice sharpened. “You cannot threaten us in my home.”

Cassidy touched the wet sleeve of her dress. It made a small dripping sound against her wrist.

“This home is under lien review because Brendan pledged company-linked securities against private loans last quarter.”

Brendan’s head snapped toward her.

“You weren’t supposed to know that.”

The words left him before he could catch them.

Silence.

Arthur closed the folder halfway.

Jessica stepped away from Brendan.

Just one step.

Brendan noticed.

That, finally, seemed to hurt him.

Not Cassidy soaked in front of him.

Not the baby kicking inside a cold shock.

Jessica moving away.

Cassidy looked at the tiny yellow socks in her wet handbag again. The tissue paper had torn. One duck eye was visible.

She pulled the socks out and placed them on the table.

No one understood why.

That was fine.

She did.

“I came tonight because I thought we were going to discuss custody language and medical support,” she said. “I thought, for once, you might remember there is a child involved.”

Brendan looked at the socks.

His face shifted, but not enough.

Never enough.

Diane glanced at them and away, as if tenderness were something unhygienic.

Cassidy turned to Arthur. “Remove every Morrison access point by morning. Full audit. Preserve records. Notify the board.”

Arthur nodded. “Already initiated.”

Brendan stepped around the chair. “Cassidy, wait.”

The security officer moved between them.

Brendan stopped.

That was new too.

All those years, no one had ever stepped between Brendan Morrison and what he wanted.

Cassidy looked at the guard, then back at Brendan.

“Don’t touch me.”

He swallowed.

“Please.”

The word did not fit him.

Diane heard it and flinched.

Jessica looked at Brendan as if he had become a stranger in his own suit.

“Please what?” Cassidy asked.

He looked around the room, searching for the right version of himself. Husband. Executive. Victim. Son. None appeared fast enough.

“We can talk.”

“We did.”

“No, we didn’t. You just brought lawyers into my mother’s house.”

Cassidy glanced around the dining room. The wet rug. The bucket. The wine. The candles still burning because rich people’s rooms did not care what happened inside them.

“I brought consequences.”

Diane’s mouth tightened. “You vindictive little—”

Arthur’s voice cut through. “Mrs. Morrison, I would be very careful.”

Diane turned on him. “You work for us.”

Arthur looked at Cassidy.

“No,” he said. “I don’t.”

The line landed harder than the legal papers.

Diane sat down.

Not gracefully.

Cassidy picked up the tiny socks again and tucked them into her palm. They were damp now, but not ruined. She could wash them. Babies ruined things every day. That was different. That was life.

This had been a choice.

Elena appeared near the service entrance with a towel. Her hands trembled.

Cassidy took it.

“Thank you.”

Elena’s eyes flicked to Diane, then to Cassidy.

“You’re welcome, ma’am.”

Arthur stepped aside. “There is a car waiting.”

Cassidy nodded.

She walked past Brendan slowly. Not for drama. Because her dress was heavy, her legs were stiff, and the baby had finally settled into a low, firm pressure that made every step feel measured.

Brendan turned as she passed.

“Cassidy.”

She stopped.

Not facing him yet.

He said, “I didn’t know.”

She looked over her shoulder.

“Yes, you did.”

Then she walked out.

The foyer looked different on the way out. Same marble. Same roses. Same chandelier above the entry. But the house had lost the thing that made it dangerous: certainty. Behind her, voices began to rise. Diane’s first. Brendan’s next. Jessica’s sharp and thin. Arthur’s remained level, which meant his patience was already gone.

At the door, Cassidy paused.

The security officer opened it for her.

Cold night air touched her wet dress and made her whole body tighten. She wrapped the towel around her shoulders and stepped outside.

A black car waited at the bottom of the stone steps.

Arthur joined her before she reached it.

“Hospital first,” he said.

“I’m fine.”

“Cassidy.”

She hated when he used that tone. Not legal. Not corporate. Human.

She looked down at her stomach.

The baby moved once.

Small.

Steady.

“Hospital first,” she said.

Arthur opened the car door.

She climbed in slowly, one hand on the roof, one hand holding the wet yellow socks. The leather seat felt too warm beneath her soaked dress.

As the car pulled away, Cassidy looked back only once.

The Morrison mansion glowed on the hill like a jewel with rot inside it.

By morning, forty-seven Morrison relatives and affiliates had received suspension notices. By noon, seven corporate credit lines were frozen. By three, Brendan’s building access failed in front of two junior analysts who pretended not to watch. Diane called six board members and reached none of them. Jessica deleted three photos from her social feed, then stopped deleting when she realized people had already taken screenshots.

Cassidy heard all of this from Arthur in clean, careful sentences while a nurse checked the baby’s heartbeat.

Strong.

Fast.

Alive.

The sound filled the small hospital room like something no company, no family, no contract could own.

Cassidy closed her eyes for four beats.

Then opened them.

Two days later, Brendan came to the hospital.

Arthur stopped him in the hallway.

Cassidy could hear their voices through the door, low and controlled. Brendan asked for five minutes. Arthur said no. Brendan said he was the father. Arthur said paternity did not create access to a patient who had declined visitors.

There was a pause.

Then Brendan said, “Tell her I’m sorry.”

Cassidy looked at the baby monitor beside the bed.

The nurse had placed the yellow socks near her bag after washing them in the sink with hospital soap. They were stiff from air drying, the little duck still uneven, still ridiculous.

Cassidy did not answer.

Arthur returned a minute later.

“He left.”

“Good.”

“You’ll need to decide how you want to handle custody communications.”

“I know.”

“And the board wants a statement.”

“Tomorrow.”

Arthur nodded. He looked tired for the first time in years. “Do you need anything else?”

Cassidy picked up the socks and rubbed the tiny cotton between her thumb and finger.

“No.”

Arthur turned to leave.

“Actually,” she said.

He stopped.

“Change the nursery curtains.”

His brow creased. “The curtains?”

“They’re too pale.”

Arthur looked at her for a second, then gave one small nod as if it were the most reasonable executive order in the world.

“What color?”

Cassidy looked toward the window, where morning light sat flat against the glass.

“Yellow.”

Arthur almost smiled.

“Yellow it is.”

After he left, Cassidy sat alone in the quiet hospital room. The world outside had begun doing what it always did after powerful people fell: talking, guessing, blaming, choosing sides, pretending they had known all along.

Cassidy placed one hand over her belly and held the tiny socks with the other.

The baby kicked once.

Not hard this time.

Just enough.

Cassidy looked down.

“I know,” she said.

Then she folded the socks again.