Blake
The air in the Vance Gallery is thick with money and perfume. It smells like ambition. White walls soar two stories high, showcasing massive, chaotic canvases of cityscapes shattered and reassembled. Waiters in black glide through a sea of designer dresses and tailored suits, balancing trays of champagne flutes like delicate, bubbling sculptures.
This is a world I know. A world I command. It should feel like coming home.
It feels like a foreign country.
I take a glass of champagne from a passing tray. The bubbles fizz against my tongue, cold and sharp. I’m supposed to be looking for her, for the solution to the void that opened up in my life this morning. But my mind keeps replaying a different scene. A silent office. A manila folder. A woman walking away without a backward glance.
“There you are.”
The voice cuts through the noise, a familiar melody I haven’t heard in nine years. I turn.
Chloe Vance is a supernova in a blood-red dress. Her blonde hair is slicked back, her smile is a weapon, and her eyes, the color of expensive whiskey, are locked on me. She doesn’t walk toward me, she carves a path, people parting before her like she’s royalty. She is exactly as I remember, only more so. More polished, more potent.
“I was beginning to think you wouldn’t show,” she says, her voice a low purr. She doesn’t offer a handshake or a polite hug. She slides her arms around my neck and presses her body against mine, a blatant act of possession for the entire room to see.
“Chloe,” I say, my hands landing awkwardly on her waist.
“You’re late,” she whispers, her lips brushing my ear. “I forgive you.”
She pulls back, but only an inch, her hands still linked behind my neck. Her gaze is intense, proprietary. “So. I heard the news. The unfortunate business with your placeholder wife is finally over.”
The words land like stones. Placeholder wife. It’s what I always called her in my own head. Hearing it from Chloe’s lips feels… vulgar.
“It’s not ‘over,’” I say, my tone sharper than I intend. “We’re getting a divorce.”
“Semantics, darling.” She dismisses it with a wave of her perfectly manicured hand, finally letting me go so she can loop her arm through mine. “A nine-year detour. A historical footnote. Now, the real story can finally get back on track.”
She starts to lead me through the crowd, her grip firm. “I want you to meet the curator from the Met. He’s been dying to acquire the piece by the window.”
“A detour?” I stop walking, forcing her to turn and face me. “It was my life, Chloe.”
Her smile is bright, unwavering, but her eyes tighten almost imperceptibly. “Was it? From what I heard, it was an arrangement. A contract. You never loved her.”
It’s not a question. It’s a statement of fact. A fact I myself have stated a thousand times to Liam, to myself.
“That’s not the point,” I say, though I’m not sure what the point is. I just know her confident dismissal grates on me. It feels like she’s erasing a part of my history, and for some reason, I don’t want it erased.
“Then what is the point, Blake?” she asks, her voice dropping, becoming intimate amidst the clamor of the party. “The point is, you’re free. You’re here. With me. Where you belong.”
She thinks this is simple. A clean equation. Subtract Brooke, add Chloe, and the world rights itself. I came here tonight believing the same thing.
But my thoughts drift. I picture Brooke in our cavernous, silent home. I picture her reading in the library, a small, solitary figure surrounded by thousands of books I’d never seen her open. Wait. No, that’s not right. She was always reading. I just never paid attention to the titles.
“What was she even like?” Chloe asks, pulling me from the memory. She sips her champagne, her eyes appraising me over the rim of the glass. “I could never get a read on her from the pictures. So… plain. Was she dreadfully boring?”
“She was quiet,” I say, the word tasting inadequate on my tongue.
“Quiet.” Chloe laughs, a tinkling sound that draws the attention of a nearby couple. “That’s a polite word for it. I can’t imagine what you two even talked about. Did she talk?”
A flash of anger, hot and unexpected, lances through me. I remember Brooke’s voice from this morning. Not quiet. It was steady. Resolute. The voice of a stranger.
“Of course she talked,” I bite out.
Chloe’s eyebrows raise in surprise at my tone. “Darling, don’t be so defensive. It was a business deal that went on too long. I get it. You had to play the part. But the curtain’s down now. You can stop protecting the hired help.”
“She wasn’t the hired help, Chloe. She was my wife.”
The words hang between us. I’ve said them. I’ve defended her. I’ve defended the marriage I claimed meant nothing. The shock on Chloe’s face is mirrored by my own internal turmoil.
Why did I say that? Why do I care what she thinks of Brooke?
Chloe recovers instantly, her expression smoothing into one of pity. “Oh, you poor thing. It really did a number on you, didn’t it? Having to pretend for so long.” She touches my cheek, her fingers cool. “Don’t worry. I’ll help you forget all about it. About her.”
She says it like a promise. A threat.
She turns and gestures to a hulking, abstract sculpture of twisted metal. “What do you think? It’s called ‘Nine Year Void.’ I thought it was fitting.”
I stare at the sculpture. It’s ugly. Cold. A monument to nothing. It’s how she sees my marriage. How I told myself I saw my marriage. So why does looking at it make me feel a strange, protective instinct for the memory of the woman I let walk away?
I’m haunted. Not by a ghost of the past, but by the woman who was right in front of me for three thousand two hundred and eighty-five days. A woman I never saw.
I look from the cold metal sculpture to Chloe’s brilliant, possessive smile. She’s beautiful, she’s exciting, she’s everything I thought I wanted. She’s the life I was supposed to have.
So why am I thinking about the resolute emptiness in Brooke’s eyes as she left me? Why does that feel more real than anything in this entire, glittering room?
“Blake?” Chloe’s voice is sharp, impatient. “Are you listening to me?”
“Yes,” I lie.
“Good.” She tightens her grip on my arm again, her red nails pressing into the sleeve of my suit. “Let’s go. It’s time to show everyone that Blake Harland is finally back on the market.”
She pulls me deeper into the party, into her world. I let her. I play the part of the returning beau. I shake hands, I smile, I nod at her effusive introductions.
But it’s a lie. I’m not here. I’m standing in a sterile office, staring at a closed door, asking a question I’m terrified to answer.
What was she there for?
