Chapter 4: Compensation Owed

Nathan and Diana took Oliver out for dinner and came home late. Claire, unused to eating alone, asked Aunt Carol to join her at the table.

Nathan noticed the gauze on her hand. "What happened there?"

"Oliver bit me this morning."

She saw no reason to hide it. If a father failed to raise his son properly, that was on him and as Oliver's biological father, that responsibility belonged squarely to Nathan.

"Nathan, he's not usually like that," Diana said, steering Oliver forward. "Go on, apologize to Aunt Claire."

Oliver clung to her leg instead and shouted, "Aunt Claire threw away my water gun and hit me! I was scared, so I bit her!"

"Hush! This is Aunt Claire's house. You listen to her, or I'll send you right back out the door!"

Right. Five years, and Diana's talent for saying one thing while meaning another hadn't dulled at all.

Claire rolled her eyes, silently.

"He's just a kid, don't frighten him," Nathan said, then turned to Claire, something almost pleading in his eyes. "Claire, he's still my son. He's mischievous, like I was. Go easy on him."

"I'm sorry on his behalf, truly," Diana added.

Anyone walking in on this scene would take them for a family of three, Claire thought.

If the parents wouldn't discipline their own child, that was their failure to sort out not hers.

But she wasn't about to let the bite go unanswered.

"It's fine. My husband will make it up to me."

She peeled back the gauze and held her hand out to Nathan.

"Look."

His jaw tightened, his expression darkening.

He'd assumed a four-year-old couldn't have done much damage.

Instead, her skin was torn, bleeding, two rows of dark indentations standing out starkly against her pale hand painful just to look at.

"Name what you want. I'll cover it."

"A house."

It was the first time Claire had ever asked Nathan for anything outright. She didn't own property of her own; the villa her parents had left her had been sold off by relatives before she was old enough to stop them, the money long gone.

"Fine. Pick whichever one you like."

He agreed without hesitation. She'd been wronged; a house seemed the least he could offer to make it right.

Something flickered across Diana's face irritation, quickly smoothed over into a smile.

"Nathan's so good to you."

Claire let out a small laugh. "Well. We were both raised by the same grandmother, and we've been married five years. We're the closest people in the world to each other."

Even she didn't quite believe it as she said it.

Nathan's parents and her own had died in the same plane crash. She'd been eight that year; he'd been eleven.

They'd shared something like real grief as children, and he'd looked out for her in a way she'd never forgotten. As an unrelated older brother, he'd taken that role seriously.

As a husband especially since Diana and Oliver had arrived he'd become someone she barely recognized.

She'd only said it to needle Diana. A small, petty satisfaction, and she'd take it.

Diana's smile strained at the edges as she looked over at Nathan with something wounded in her expression.

Nathan, oblivious, changed the subject entirely.

"Claire, I've arranged everything for you at the company. You start tomorrow morning."

"I already have a job."

He smiled faintly. "You don't need to keep up appearances with me. There's no shame in not finding work. I'll cover for you either way, work as many days as you like, or don't work at all and go back to your flowers."

A chill ran down her spine. "I start tomorrow. At my own job."

It was almost laughable, how certain he was that she couldn't manage this on her own.

If she hadn't spent the last five years caring for him full-time, she'd already have a career worth something.

"Which company, out of curiosity?" Diana asked. "Nathan might know someone there."

Claire hesitated; she still half-doubted the offer herself.

Vantage was a name people fought tooth and nail to get near. The interviewer had rejected her outright, and yet the offer email had come through regardless.

She'd checked the sender twice. It was legitimate Vantage's own HR department.

A company that size didn't make careless mistakes. And yet the whole thing felt strange enough that she wanted proof before she said it out loud.

If she named the company now and it turned out to be some clerical error, the embarrassment in front of Nathan and Diana would be unbearable.

Nathan read her hesitation as confirmation that she was lying.

He'd already had his assistant call around; she wasn't even getting her résumé past the front desk at most major firms.

"You don't even know the company's name? Someone's playing you for a fool. I'll have Hughes drive you tomorrow."

"And if it falls through, you can always come back to me."

"Thanks for the offer. I don't need it."

Claire rose and walked out of the crowded living room.

Every word out of his mouth was framed as kindness. Everything he actually did left a bruise.

Five years ago she'd chosen Nathan and walked away from her first love. Maybe this all of it was just what she owed for that choice.

Before bed, Nathan wheeled himself to the doorway. "Oliver's insisting I stay with him tonight."

Claire gave a flat "mm," relief flooding through her the second the door closed.

Nathan spent the night in Diana's wing. If he'd climbed into bed beside her again tonight, she wasn't sure she could've stood it.

Right now, all she could think about was Vantage.

That flash of hair in the VIP elevator hadn't left her mind since.

She was probably just imagining things missing someone she shouldn't be missing.

After their breakup, he'd gone back to Italy. He'd never once come back to the city since.

"Goodnight, sweetheart."

Nathan reached out and patted her head. She flinched back into the blanket like she'd been shocked.

He paused, something dimming behind his eyes, and left the room without another word.

—

The next morning, Claire left early to avoid running into Nathan altogether.

She ate breakfast in the lobby of the Vantage building and waited over an hour before employees started filtering in for the day.

She found the HR department and explained why she was there.

"The interviewer turned me down yesterday. Are you sure the offer email wasn't sent to me by mistake?"

The round-faced woman at the desk smiled. "Ms. Whitfield, we don't make that kind of error."

"The interviewer's recommendation was a no. But the Chairman reviewed your résumé personally and decided to bring you on."

Claire was startled. She couldn't think of a single thing in her résumé that would catch the attention of a man who had his pick of the country's top talent.

HR had no further explanation either, only that there was, without question, no mistake.

Claire collected her employee badge and headed up to the 96th floor.

The open-plan office was vast, sunlit, immaculate.

A man approached her. "Hello Assistant Reed."

Something like surprise flickered across his face. Anyone who caught the Chairman's personal attention on sight had to be worth a second look.

Claire shook his hand, easy and composed. "Claire Whitfield. Pleasure to meet you. I hope you'll look out for me."

Two other men and a woman in the office, all secretaries from the executive floor greeted her in turn.

Once the introductions settled, she asked quietly, "Assistant Reed, I interviewed for the intelligent-exoskeleton engineering role. Is there some mix-up?"

She'd spent five years researching exactly that field quietly hoping that one day, it might let Nathan walk again.

"Chairman Pryce reviewed your résumé and felt you'd be better suited as his personal secretary."

"That's his office there." Reed gestured toward the far end of the floor, where a short flight of dark wood steps led up to an elegant set of double doors. "If the bell on your desk rings, that means he's asking for you."

"Understood. Thank you, Assistant Reed."

Since she was already here, she might as well make the most of it getting a foot in the door at Vantage at all was rare enough.

She decided to establish herself first, then look for a chance to transfer internally later.

Curious, she searched for information on Sebastian Pryce, Vantage's chairman. He kept an unusually low profile; the only photo she found was from a university guest lecture, years old.

Something about his face nagged at her, familiar in a way she couldn't place.

She must have been mistaken. Since the wedding she'd had almost no social life outside of Sophie Bennett, her closest friend. Nathan had never once taken her to an event that would've put her in the same room as someone like Sebastian Pryce.