Chapter Three.. Let's Start An Affair

Valentina threw her arms around Elowen before she could step back.

​"I was starting to think you two wouldn't make it!" She pulled away, her hands still resting on Elowen's arms, and her bright eyes searched her face. "You look so pale. Are you feeling alright?"

​Elowen's stomach tightened. The perfume was the same one Valentina always wore, and so was the warmth in her voice. It was almost unbearable how exactly the same it was.

​"Just a long day at work," she said, surprised by how steady her voice sounded.

​"You work too hard." Valentina clicked her tongue, then turned to Kieran with a smile. "Thank you for bringing her."

​"I wouldn't miss it," Kieran replied.

​His voice was easy and polite. Elowen watched his face, and for the first time in her marriage, she found herself searching for something in it. A glance held a second too long. A softness around the eyes. She found nothing, and somehow that frightened her more than if she had.

​How long have they been doing this to me?

​"Come, you have to meet everyone." Valentina linked her arm through Elowen's and drew her into the crowd, laughing and greeting guests along the way.

​Elowen let herself be led. She smiled when the others smiled and answered when they spoke to her. Her body moved through the ballroom like a trained actor's, while her mind stayed somewhere far behind, in a quiet office, on a small, glowing screen.

​Near the center of the room, a man in a dark suit stood among the guests with a glass in his hand. The faint scar along his face caught the chandelier light.

​Lysander.

​As the host's husband, he was receiving congratulations alongside Valentina. She slipped her hand into the crook of his arm with practiced ease and smiled up at him like a woman in love.

​"Look who's here, darling. Elowen and Kieran."

​"Brother," Lysander said, nodding at Kieran. Then his amber eyes moved to Elowen and stayed there. "Sister-in-law."

​Elowen's breath caught. Heat rose up her neck, and she looked away too quickly.

​"Brother," Kieran answered with an equally brief nod.

​Neither of them said anything more. Elowen had witnessed this exchange at a dozen family dinners and had never given it a second thought. Now, she noticed how Valentina's hand tightened around Lysander's arm, as if she were afraid he might say something he shouldn't.

​A little later, the music faded, and a host in a black suit took the microphone.

​"Ladies and gentlemen, please welcome the star of tonight's celebration."

​Applause rolled through the ballroom. Valentina walked up to the stage in her pale gown, lifted a hand to the crowd, and stood beneath the lights as though she had been born there.

​"Thank you all for coming," she said, her voice soft and a little shaky, as if she were holding back tears. "This film took more than a year of my life. There were days I wanted to give up. But there were people who never let me."

​She turned her eyes to the crowd.

​"My husband, Lysander, who stayed by my side even when I was away from home for weeks."

​Applause followed. Lysander lifted his glass slightly but didn't smile.

​"And Kieran, whose company believed in this project when no one else did. I will never be able to thank you enough."

​Her gaze rested on Kieran for one second longer than it needed to.

​Elowen saw it.

​She would have missed it yesterday. Yesterday, she would have thought it was gratitude. Now, it looked like a hand reaching across the room.

​Kieran raised his glass in return, and his mouth curved into a small, private smile.

​Elowen's fingers tightened around her own glass until she felt the stem press into her skin.

​Sensing someone's gaze on her, she turned and found Lysander watching her from across the room. His amber eyes met hers, and for a moment, neither of them looked away.

​Elowen looked away first.

​A moment later, Valentina finished her speech, and the ballroom filled with applause. She smiled as she stepped down from the stage, immediately surrounded by guests offering their congratulations.

​Kieran moved forward to greet the director and producers, and Valentina soon joined him. As one of the film's major backers, he was naturally drawn into conversations with the people involved in the project.

​Elowen remained where she was, holding her glass as she watched them mingle with the guests. Kieran was deep in conversation with the director, while Valentina stood beside him, smiling and occasionally joining in.

​She tried to focus on the other guests around her, but the sight of them together made it difficult to breathe normally. She couldn't keep standing there pretending everything was fine.

​After a moment, Elowen lifted her glass, took a few sips, and quietly made her way out of the ballroom.

​The noise of the celebration faded as she stepped into the hallway. The champagne had gone to her head faster than she expected. A warm heaviness had settled behind her eyes, and the floor felt slightly unsteady beneath her heels. She followed the corridor to a wide window at its far end, where the cool air from a cracked pane touched her face, and she let out a slow breath, finally free of the need to smile and pretend.

​She stopped there and stared out at the city, though she saw none of it.

​A while later, footsteps sounded behind her, unhurried and steady. They stopped at her side.

​"Would you like some?"

​She turned her head. Lysander was holding two glasses, one of them held out to her.

​She looked at it for a moment, then took it. "Thank you."

​She turned back to the window. He did not say anything else. He stood beside her, his eyes on the glass, and for a long time neither of them spoke. The music was only a dull thump through the wall.

​At last, Elowen's voice came, low and hoarse.

​"How long?"

​Lysander glanced at her profile. She had not finished the question, and she did not need to. He understood.

​"I'm not sure," he said. "I only found out last week."

​Elowen said nothing. Her eyes remained fixed on the view outside.

​"I used to think all those trips and meetings were work-related," Lysander continued. "The times Valentina travelled for filming or had to stay away for days. I never thought much of it until I discovered the truth. Some of those trips were just excuses for her and Kieran to meet."

​Elowen's fingers tightened around her glass.

​"So they're doing this even when she told you she was away for work?"

​"Apparently."

​She lowered her gaze, trying to make sense of it all.

​He was quiet for a moment before he spoke again. "Kieran and I have never been on good terms. We've always hated each other, but I never imagined he would do something like this."

​He paused, letting the words settle between them.

​"And Valentina." He let out a quiet breath. "She has been your friend for years. More than that, she's been your best friend. And she still chose to betray you."

​Elowen's fist curled at her side.

​It was true. She and Valentina had been close long before either of them married into the Wells family. Marrying the two brothers had only brought them closer. They had shared secrets, laughed together, and stood by each other through hard times.

​Who would have thought that the woman she had trusted so much had been looking at her husband the whole time?

​Elowen tipped her head back and drank the glass down. The champagne burned on the way down, and it did nothing to dull the video playing behind her eyes. Kieran's hands. Valentina's voice.

​After everything I did for him, he did this.

​Irritation rose in her chest, hot and bitter.

​Was it so good, being with her? Wasn't I enough? She was beautiful. She knew she was. Her face, her figure, everything a man could want, and still he had gone to someone else.

​Lysander watched the storm of emotion break across her face, seeing the exact raw, shattered hurt he had expected.

​"We don't deserve what they did to us," Lysander said quietly and deliberately, his voice carrying a bitter, heavy truth.

​Of course they didn't. She had been faithful, loving, and entirely devoted to her husband, yet she hadn't been enough for him.

​A dry, humorless laugh slipped past Lysander's lips—a sound laced with deep, lingering pain. "They really think they can get away with it, don't they? Why don't we just give them a taste of their own medicine?"

​Elowen turned her head, narrowing her eyes slightly as the alcohol buzzed through her mind. "What do you mean?"

​Lysander didn't blink. His amber eyes seethed with a dark, quiet intensity as he held her gaze, finally laying his intentions completely bare.

​"You and me," he said, his voice dropping low and blunt. "Let's start an affair."

​Elowen froze, the glass slipping slightly in her grip as the staggering reality of his words hit her.

​What?