A few minutes later, Daniel leaned close to me.
“Claire, please go wait near the service hallway until dinner.”
I stared at him.
“You want your wife to stand beside the kitchen?”
“Tonight is important.”
“So am I.”
His expression hardened.
“Don’t make this about you.”
Something inside me quietly broke.
For eight years, I had supported Daniel’s career.
I edited his presentations.
I checked his financial models.
I hosted clients in our apartment.
I listened patiently while he told me that every late night and missed weekend was for “our future.”
And yet, standing in that ballroom, I realized his future apparently looked better without me visible in it.
There was one thing Daniel never understood about me.
For eight years, I had carried a piece of my past around my neck.
A small silver pendant.
It wasn’t particularly expensive-looking.
Oval-shaped, slightly worn, with a tiny falcon engraved beneath three stars.
My mother had given it to me shortly before she died.
She never explained what the symbol meant.
She only told me one strange thing.
“If anyone named Halston ever recognizes this necklace, Claire, don’t run.”
I had always assumed grief had made her unusually dramatic.
Until that night.
Suddenly, applause erupted across the ballroom.
A silver-haired man entered through the main doors.
Richard Halston.
Founder of Halston Meridian.
A billionaire.
Daniel’s personal hero.
Daniel grabbed my arm again.
