All Chapters of VOWS IN THE WAR ROOM: Chapter 21 - Chapter 30

The clinic didn’t look like a clinic.No bright posters. No plastic chairs. No bored children dragging toys across the floor. Just quiet glass, pale stone, and a receptionist who didn’t blink when Gabriel walked in like he owned the building.They took Renaud through a side door. No questions. No furrows in my face. Someone had already called ahead.I stayed close anyway.A nurse tried to guide me to a waiting area.“I’m his wife,” I said.She looked at Gabriel, not me.Gabriel nodded once. “She stays.”So I stayed.They moved fast. They cut away the cuff of his sleeve. They clipped something to his finger. The screen above him pulsed with numbers that meant nothing to me and everything to everyone else.Renaud’s face had turned a shade too pale under the lights. The stubborn line of his mouth was still there, though, like his body had decided to betray him and his p

The handle turned again.Slow. Careful. Like whoever held it had time.I stepped back from the wall of photos and timelines, my palm still warm from the paper I’d just touched. The lights in the war room stayed bright, almost cheerful, like this place didn’t understand shame.The latch clicked.I looked for a weapon and found… a stapler.Perfect. If I survived tonight, I’d frame it.The steel door opened a few inches. A slice of darkness cut into the room. Then a face appeared in that gap...lined, familiar, annoyed.Colette.She slid inside and shut the door behind her with the same care she used when setting a tray down.For one beat, neither of us spoke. The air felt tight, like it was waiting to snap.Colette’s eyes traveled over the wall.Then to me.Then back to the wall again.“You have a talent,” she said, voice low, “for walking into pla

Morning arrived like it was pretending nothing happened.Sunlight spilled over the river beyond the estate windows. The kitchen smelled of coffee and bread. A normal day, if you ignored the security team posted at every corridor like statues with earpieces.Colette hadn’t been seen since midnight.Nobody said her name out loud.I ate two bites of toast and tasted nothing.Across the table, Renaud skimmed a stack of printed logs. His hair was still damp from a rushed shower, his face clean, his mood not.Gabriel stood by the door, silent as a locked safe.Sabine entered without knocking, wearing a pale suit that looked expensive in a way that didn’t ask permission.“Good,” she said, eyes on Renaud. “You’re upright.”Renaud didn’t look up. “Don’t congratulate me. Investigate.”Sabine’s gaze flicked to me. Quick. Cold.“Your wife,&rd

"What did you hear?”Gabriel’s voice stayed low, like the books themselves were listening.My throat worked once, twice. I don’t like being unsure. I hated sounding dramatic even more. But the corridor outside the locked wing still holds that sharp, citrus-clean smell, and it’s too fresh for an old stone house that rarely opens this side.“It was… soft,” I said at last. “Like someone trying not to be heard.”Gabriel’s eyes flick to the seam where the wallpaper meets the carved wood paneling. He doesn’t answer right away. He leans in, palm flat to the wall, then lifts it and sniffs like he’s testing a glass.“Cleaner,” he mutters. “Not the usual one.”My brows pinch. “How did you know the usual one?”He gives me a look that says, "You married into a family that pays people to notice everything."“Because I’ve

The headline was folded with care, like it deserved respect.Colette set it beside my coffee and pretended it was just another morning. “Your mail.”“It’s a newspaper,” I said.“News is mail with opinions,” she replied, then turned toward the window as if the river had suddenly become fascinating.I didn’t touch the paper at first. I stared at it the way you stare at a bruise before you admit it hurts.Renaud walked in without a sound. He wore charcoal today, crisp and exact, as if he’d been pressed into shape. He glanced at the folded page, then at me.“You don’t have to read it,” he said.“That’s never true,” I murmured.His mouth tightened. “It’s noise.”“It’s a knife,” I corrected, and pulled the paper closer.There it was. A photo of me stepping out of the town hall, my hand on his arm