Playing Our Parts

The Vaughn Foundation's autumn benefit filled the Hendricks Ballroom with candlelight and enough diamonds to fund a small country. Hannah had been to a hundred rooms like this one as Danny's wife. She had never once walked into one on Andy's arm.

"You're staring at the door," Andy said, low, close to her ear. "Relax your shoulders. You look like you're about to run."

"I feel like I'm about to run."

"Good. Do it anyway." His hand found the small of her back, warm through the silk of her dress, and steered her toward the room instead of away from it. "Everyone in this ballroom already knows your husband is sleeping with my wife. Tonight, we give them something else to talk about."

They made it four steps before the first head turned. By the tenth, conversations were dying mid-sentence all across the room.

Hannah kept her chin up and let Andy's hand stay exactly where it was.

She spotted Danny near the bar before he spotted her — tuxedo, drink already in hand, Gianna beside him in emerald green, her fingers curled possessively around his arm like she'd stopped bothering to hide it. Then Danny looked up, and his whole face rearranged itself around the sight of his wife and his brother walking in together, Andy's hand still resting low on her back.

"Don't look away first," Andy murmured. "That's rule one of tonight."

"You didn't mention there were rules for tonight."

"There's always a rule." His mouth curved, not quite a smile. "Smile at him. Not too much. Just enough that he starts wondering what you know."

Hannah smiled.

Across the room, Danny's jaw tightened in a way she recognized from a hundred arguments she'd lost. Gianna's grip on his arm didn't loosen, but her eyes had gone sharp, tracking Andy's hand at Hannah's waist like she was doing math she didn't like the answer to.

The orchestra shifted into something slow. Andy didn't ask.

He simply took her hand and led her onto the floor, and for one disorienting moment Hannah forgot there was an audience at all. His hand settled at her waist properly this time, his other closing around hers, and he moved like a man who'd been forced through a decade of ballroom lessons and had never once enjoyed them until now.

"You dance like you're solving an equation," she said.

"I'm very good at equations."

"That wasn't a compliment."

"I know." His eyes hadn't left hers since the music started. "Ask me something else instead."

"Why did you really ask me here tonight? The real reason, not the revenge one."

Andy's hand tightened, just slightly, at her waist. For a moment he didn't answer, and the silence between them said more than she was ready to hear.

"Because I spent six years watching you across rooms like this one, married to my brother, and telling myself I didn't mind." His voice had dropped low enough that it belonged only to her. "I mind, Hannah. I've minded every single time."

The music swelled. She should have said something. She didn't get the chance.

"Mind if I cut in?"

Preston Cole — Vaughn Holdings' newest board member, and a man who'd made his interest in Hannah fairly clear at every function she'd attended without Danny — was already reaching for her hand before Andy could answer for either of them.

Andy's grip on her waist didn't loosen. If anything, it steadied.

"She does," Andy said, pleasant and absolutely final. "Try again in an hour, Preston."

Preston laughed like it might be a joke, glanced between them, and decided it wasn't. He retreated toward the bar with considerably less confidence than he'd arrived with.

Hannah looked up at Andy, fighting a smile she didn't fully understand. "That was almost embarrassing."

"For him."

"You didn't even ask if I wanted to keep dancing with you."

"Did you?"

"Yes," she admitted, before she could decide whether that was wise. "But you should still ask next time."

"Noted." Something eased in his expression, just slightly. "Next time, I'll ask."

Across the ballroom, Gianna had gone very still, watching them the way a woman watches a fire she's not sure she started. Danny had stopped pretending to talk to the people around him entirely.

The song ended. Andy didn't step back right away, his hand lingering at her waist a beat longer than the music required, and Hannah found she didn't step back either.

"They're watching," she said quietly.

"Let them."

"Andy—"

"One more song," he said, and it wasn't really a question. "Then I'll take you home, and tomorrow they'll spend the whole day wondering what happened after we left."

Hannah glanced past his shoulder. Gianna had crossed half the ballroom already, heels sharp against marble, moving toward them with the particular determination of a woman who had just decided she wasn't going to watch quietly anymore.

"I don't think we're getting one more song," Hannah said.

Andy followed her gaze, and for the first time all night, his easy calm slipped, just slightly, into something sharper.

"No," he agreed. "I don't think we are."

Gianna arrived with a practiced smile already in place, the kind she wore for photographers, and slid it on like armor before she spoke.

"Andy. Hannah." Her eyes moved over their joined hands, the space between them that hadn't quite closed. "You two look very... comfortable."

"We're old friends," Andy said. "You remember. Hannah and I grew up together."

"I remember you telling me you barely spoke anymore." Gianna's smile didn't move, but something behind her eyes did. "Funny how quickly that's changed."

"People change," Hannah said. "You'd know."

For one bright, silent second, Gianna's composure cracked — just enough to show what was underneath it. Then it smoothed back into place, like it had never slipped at all.

"Danny's asking for you," she said to Hannah, too sweetly. "Something about finalizing the paperwork. Tonight, apparently. He seems eager to move things along."

Andy's hand went still at Hannah's back.

"Tell him I'll call his lawyer Monday," Hannah said.

"I think he'd rather hear it from you himself." Gianna's gaze flicked to Andy, then back, sharp as a blade turned sideways. "Both of you, actually. He's waiting by the terrace. He said it can't wait until Monday."

Hannah felt Andy go very still beside her — the stillness of a man recalculating everything he thought he knew about how tonight was supposed to go.

"What paperwork?" he asked.

Gianna only smiled wider, and said nothing at all.