Chapter Fifty-Three
● The Performance of Normalcy
"You'll attend."
The words came three days later, delivered across the breakfast table like a weather report. No warmth. No invitation. Just fact.
I looked up from my untouched toast. "Attend what?"
Rowan didn't lift his eyes from his tablet. "Dinner. Tomorrow night. With associates and their wives."
The toast turned to ash in my mouth. I set it down carefully, buying time, fighting the instinctive recoil that tightened my chest.
"No."
Now he looked up.
The silence that followed was a living thing—cold, patient, dangerous. He didn't speak. He didn't need to. His gaze simply settled on me, waiting, as if I had made an amusing error that required no immediate correction.
I forced myself to meet his eyes. "I'm not ready."
"That's irrelevant."
"It's not irrelevant to me." My voice shook, but I pushed through. "The last time I was paraded in front of people who know who I am, I spent the night being—" I stopped. Swallowed. "I spent the night performing. I can't do that again. Not yet."
Something flickered in his expression. Too fast to name. Then it was gone.
"You can and you will."
"Why?"
"Because perception matters." He set the tablet down, giving me the full weight of his attention. It was worse than his indifference. "The business world runs on appearances. You are my wife. Your absence from events creates speculation. Speculation creates weakness. Weakness is exploited."
"I'm not a prop."
"No. You're a statement." He leaned back, arms crossing. "The statement is that the Royce marriage is stable. Functional. Real. Every time you refuse to appear, you undermine that."
I wanted to scream. To throw something. To remind him of the bruises still fading on my ribs, the marks hidden beneath my clothes, the way I still woke some nights gasping from dreams I couldn't escape.
But screaming didn't work with Rowan. Nothing worked.
"I tried to refuse," I said quietly, more to myself than to him.
"And I insisted." He stood, gathering his tablet, already moving toward the door. "A car will collect you at seven tomorrow. Wear something appropriate. Mrs. O'Malley will help you choose."
He was gone before I could respond.
---
The dress arrived at noon.
Mrs. O'Malley brought it in, her expression carefully neutral, but her eyes betrayed a flicker of something—sympathy, perhaps. Or resignation.
"It's beautiful, Mrs. Royce," she said softly, laying the garment bag on the bed.
Beautiful.
The word felt obscene.
I unzipped the bag slowly. Inside was a dress the color of deep wine—burgundy, rich, expensive. Long-sleeved, high-necked, modest in cut but unmistakably elegant. It covered everything while announcing itself as couture.
Strategic covering.
I recognized the design instantly. Not for me—for them. For the associates and their wives. A dress that said respectable wife without saying anything at all.
I ran my fingers over the fabric. Silk. Heavy. Real.
"What time did he say?" I asked.
"Seven, Mrs. Royce. Leon will drive you."
Drive me. Not us.
"Will Mr. Royce be accompanying me?"
Mrs. O'Malley hesitated. "I believe he'll meet you there, ma'am. He had meetings across the city this afternoon."
Of course he did.
I was to arrive alone. To be delivered like a package. To stand in a room full of strangers wearing his name and his dress and his silence, performing normalcy while he made grand entrances.
I laughed—a small, bitter sound.
Mrs. O'Malley didn't ask why.
---
Seven came too fast.
The dress fit perfectly, as I'd known it would. It skimmed my body without clinging, the wine-dark color deepening my pallor into something almost artistic. Mrs. O'Malley had pinned my hair up, exposing the line of my neck, the curve of my shoulders.
I stared at myself in the mirror.
A stranger looked back.
Elegant. Polished. Untouchable.
The bruises had faded to yellow-green, mostly hidden by the high neckline. Only the faintest edge peeked out near my collarbone—a whisper of evidence that no one would notice unless they were looking.
No one would be looking.
They'd be looking at the wife. The statement. The prop.
Leon was waiting by the car. He opened the door without comment, his face its usual mask. I slid into the back seat and watched the city blur past, each streetlight a counting-down clock.
The restaurant was private—a converted townhouse in the old district, all warm wood and low lighting and the kind of discretion that cost more than most people's annual salaries. Leon escorted me to the entrance, where a hostess in black smiled professionally and guided me upstairs.
The private dining room occupied the entire top floor.
Windows lined three walls, offering views of the city's glittering spine. A long table dominated the center, set with crystal and silver and small floral arrangements that probably cost more than my first apartment. People stood in clusters, drinks in hand, laughter floating on currents of expensive perfume and careful conversation.
I stood in the doorway, frozen.
Seven faces turned toward me.
Seven smiles snapped into place.
And then Rowan was there—appearing from nowhere, his hand settling at the small of my back with practiced ease.
"Everyone," he said smoothly, "this is my wife, Aira."
Wife.
Not Aira. Not my name. Just the title.
The women descended first.
They were all older than me, polished to a high gleam, their smiles calibrated to show welcome without warmth. They asked about the penthouse, the wedding, my adjustment to "this wonderful city." They complimented the dress, my hair, the "delicate" look of me.
I answered in monosyllables. Smiled on cue. Let them fill the silence with their own assumptions.
The men were worse.
They looked at me differently—assessing, appreciative, but careful. I was Rowan Royce's property. They would look, but they wouldn't touch. Not even with their eyes, not overtly.
But I felt it. The weight of their curiosity. The calculation behind their smiles.
Dinner was an ordeal of small courses and smaller talk.
I sat beside Rowan, close enough to feel the warmth of him, far enough to remember the distance. He didn't touch me again after that first guiding hand. Didn't look at me. Didn't include me in conversations.
I was decor.
Beautiful, silent, present.
The wife of one of the associates—a woman named Cynthia with sharp eyes and softer edges—leaned toward me during a pause in the table-wide conversation.
"First time at one of these?" she asked quietly.
I nodded.
She smiled, and for a moment, it looked genuine. "It gets easier. Or you get better at pretending it does." She glanced at Rowan, then back at me. "He's protective. That's rare in this world."
Protective.
I almost laughed.
Instead, I said, "He's thorough."
Cynthia's eyes flickered—understanding, perhaps. Or recognition. She nodded once, then turned back to the conversation, leaving me alone with my wine and my thoughts.
The evening stretched.
Courses came and went. Laughter rose and fell. Rowan made deals in the spaces between dessert and coffee, his voice low and certain, his presence commanding without effort.
And I sat beside him.
Smiling.
Silent.
Performing.
When it was finally over—when the last guest had kissed my cheek and murmured pleasantries about seeing me again—I stood alone by the windows, watching the city below, waiting for Rowan to finish his final conversation.
He appeared beside me without sound.
"You did well."
The words were flat. Clinical. Assessment, not praise.
I didn't turn. "I performed."
"That's what this is."
I finally looked at him. The city lights traced the lines of his face, sharp and unyielding. He looked tired—the kind of tired that never showed in public, only here, in the spaces between.
"I tried to refuse," I said quietly. "You insisted."
"Yes."
"Why?"
He was silent for a long moment. Then, so quietly I almost missed it: "Because they need to see you. And you need to be seen."
"By them?"
He turned to face me fully. "By yourself."
The words hung in the air between us, unexpected, unexplained. Before I could ask what they meant, he was walking away, issuing instructions to the hostess, disappearing into the role that consumed him.
I stood alone by the window, the city glittering below, and wondered if he had just said something true—or if I was so desperate for meaning that I saw it where none existed.
The car ride home was silent.
Back in the penthouse, I shed the wine-dark dress like armor, letting it pool on the bathroom floor. In the mirror, my reflection showed a woman who had survived another night.
Bruises fading.
Smile intact.
Heart still beating.
I climbed into bed and lay in the dark, listening for footsteps that didn't come.
He slept in the study that night.
Or didn't sleep at all.
I never knew which.
But when morning came, breakfast was laid for one.
And the performance, I knew, would have to be rehearsed again.