Chapter 3 - I Don't Owe You an Apology

Ailsa had expected Callum Sinclair to come back angry.

She had not expected him to arrive at Exit less than an hour after his sister left the wedding.

He stood on the other side of the glass entrance, still dressed for the ceremony, his dark suit immaculate except for rain at the shoulders. Edinburgh had managed to turn a bright afternoon gray in the time it took Ailsa to get back to the office.

Callum looked as if the weather had personally inconvenienced him.

Ailsa opened the door before he could knock twice.

"You found us," Ailsa said.

"I wasn't looking for a challenge."

"Then today has been disappointing for you."

His expression barely changed, but his attention sharpened. At the wedding, anger had made him easy to read. Here, he had put it behind something colder.

"Private room," he said.

"No."

His gaze moved past her into the quiet office.

Ailsa folded her arms. "You don't get to walk into my workplace and start issuing instructions."

"I'm not here to make a scene."

"Good. That saves us both time."

She led him to the small meeting room nearest the entrance and left the door open.

Callum noticed. Of course he did.

He remained standing until she sat, then took the chair opposite her. He offered no apology and wasted no movement. Ailsa had met powerful men who performed importance like a stage act. Callum did not need the performance. He expected the room to reorganize around him.

This one would not.

"I know Eilidh contacted Exit herself," he said.

That was not the accusation Ailsa had expected.

She kept her face neutral. "Then we're making progress."

"I know she asked for you. I know she walked out under her own power. I know she got into the car voluntarily."

"All useful facts," Ailsa said.

"Don't."

"Don't what?" Ailsa asked.

"Treat this like you've won something."

Ailsa leaned back. "Your sister didn't marry a man she didn't want to marry. If you need to call that a loss, the problem isn't mine."

His jaw set. The explosion from outside the venue had gone. What remained was controlled enough to require more attention, not less.

"You created the conditions for her to leave," he said.

"I made leaving possible."

"You arrived at her wedding forty-three minutes before the ceremony."

"Because she contacted us," Ailsa said.

"You gave her a route out."

"Yes," Ailsa said.

"And you think none of what happened after that belongs to you?"

Ailsa held his gaze. "I think Eilidh's decision belongs to Eilidh."

Callum's fingers rested flat on the table. "She was under pressure."

"Exactly," Ailsa said.

"That isn't what I meant."

"I know."

For the first time, silence caught between them instead of belonging entirely to him.

He had done his homework. That mattered. He had gone from accusing Ailsa of taking his sister to reconstructing what Eilidh had actually done. Plenty of people with less power would have protected the first story because it was easier on their pride.

Callum had changed his accusation when the evidence changed.

He was still wrong, but at least he was wrong more precisely now.

"Did you tell her to leave Lachlan?" he asked.

"No."

"Did you tell her the marriage would be a mistake?"

"No," Ailsa said.

"What did you tell her?"

"That she had options."

His eyes narrowed. "Which options?"

"That's between Exit and Eilidh," Ailsa said.

"I'm her brother."

"You're still not Eilidh."

The words landed. Ailsa watched him decide whether to push harder.

"What did she say to you?" he asked.

"I can't tell you."

"Why did she call?"

"I can't tell you," Ailsa said.

"Where is she?"

"You know she's safe," Ailsa said.

"That wasn't my question."

"No. It's the answer you're entitled to."

He sat back at last. "You understand that my family won't accept that."

"Your family's acceptance isn't one of our operating requirements."

"Malcolm Campbell won't accept it either."

"Also not a requirement," Ailsa said.

"This isn't an abstract principle, Ms. Fraser."

"No. It became very concrete when your sister walked out in a wedding dress."

Something flashed in his face. Anger, certainly. He was also measuring consequences even while he argued with her.

Ailsa recognized competence when she saw it. She also recognized its favorite lie: if you could solve enough problems, eventually other people's choices became problems too.

Callum lowered his voice. "The wedding tied together more than two people."

"That doesn't turn either person into infrastructure."

"You think I don't know that?"

"I think you're in my office asking me to hand over information because your family is uncomfortable with the answer Eilidh already gave," Ailsa said.

"She gave me one message."

"Then one message is what she chose to give you."

His stare held hers.

The room had gone too still. Ailsa became aware of the narrow table between them, of Callum's hands, of the rain darkening the shoulders of his jacket. He was furious with her, and the fact that he kept choosing control over intimidation made him harder to dismiss.

That irritated her more than his anger had.

"Is Exit against marriage?" he asked.

Ailsa almost laughed. "No."

"You specialize in helping people leave relationships."

"We specialize in making choice materially possible. Sometimes that means leaving. Sometimes it means giving someone enough independence to stay because they actually want to," Ailsa said.

"You expect me to believe you have no opinion on marriage?"

"Exit doesn't," Ailsa said.

"I didn't ask about Exit."

There it was again: the unnerving precision.

Ailsa could have told him it was irrelevant. It was. But she had spent the day insisting that choices belonged to the people who made them. Hiding hers because he might weaponize it would feel too much like giving him authority over it.

"I'll never marry," she said.

Callum went completely still.

Ailsa let the statement sit there without explanation.

His gaze searched her face. "Never."

"That's usually what the word means."

"And yet you run an organization you insist isn't anti-marriage."

"My life is not company policy," Ailsa said.

"Convenient distinction."

"Necessary distinction." She leaned forward. "If a woman comes to Exit wanting enough financial independence to leave her husband, we help her evaluate that choice. If she uses the same independence to stay on different terms, that's her choice too. I don't need to want her life in order to respect that it's hers."

"And Eilidh?"

"Is entitled to the same respect."

Callum stood.

Ailsa stayed seated.

"My father and Malcolm Campbell are treating this as a family crisis," he said. "They want explanations. They want to know whether Eilidh is going back. They want to know what you did."

"I opened a door."

"You keep saying that as though it absolves you."

"No." Ailsa rose, meeting him across the table. "I'm saying I don't owe you an apology for making sure she had a door to open."

His attention fixed on her with an intensity that would have been easier to ignore if she had not felt it all the way down her spine.

"Then give me access to her."

"I can't," Ailsa said.

"Tell me how to contact her."

"You already have her number," Ailsa said.

"She isn't answering."

"Then she's choosing not to answer."

His control cracked at the edges. "Tell me why she left."

Ailsa walked to the open door and held it for him.

"Ask her yourself."