Rhea
A soft knock comes at my bedroom door. I don't answer. I’m sitting on the edge of my bed, staring at the stock market app on my phone. Innovate Dynamics is still trading for pennies. My stomach is a knot of cold resolve.
The knock comes again, followed by the soft click of the lock. My stepmother’s master key, no doubt. The door opens and Delilah glides in, carrying a silver tray. On it, a porcelain teapot steams gently next to a cup and saucer. She’s wearing a cream-colored cashmere lounge set, looking effortlessly elegant, as if the world hasn’t been on fire for the last twelve hours.
She closes the door behind her with a quiet click. “I told Father to give you some space,” she says, her voice a soft, sympathetic murmur. “You’ve been through so much.”
She places the tray on my bedside table and pours the tea. The scent of chamomile and honey fills the air. It’s supposed to be calming. It makes my teeth ache.
“I didn’t ask for tea,” I say, my voice flat.
“Of course you didn’t, sweetie.” She sits beside me, her hip just barely brushing mine. It feels like an invasion. “But I know you. When you’re upset, you forget to take care of yourself.”
I say nothing. I just stare at the phone in my hand. Her performance is flawless. The concerned older sister, tending to her wounded sibling.
“The things they’re writing online… it’s just dreadful,” she says with a sigh, tucking a strand of auburn hair behind her ear. “It’s a good thing Father is getting ahead of it. He’s painting you as the tragic victim. It’s the only way to play this.”
“I am the victim,” I say, the words tasting like ash in my mouth.
She picks up the teacup and presses it into my hands. Her fingers are cool against mine. “Of course you are. But we have to be smart about this, Rhea. This world… our world… it isn’t kind to women who make scenes.”
Her condescension is a physical thing, a pressure in the air. I make my hand tremble slightly as I take the cup. “I didn’t know what else to do. He broke my heart.”
“Oh, I know.” She pats my knee, a gesture one might give a distraught child. “But Ellis is… well, he’s a man. A very powerful, very handsome man. They make mistakes. They have certain… appetites.”
I look at her, my eyes wide with manufactured disbelief. “Appetites? Delilah, he cheated on me. On our engagement night.”
“It was a misunderstanding,” she says smoothly, her voice dropping to a conspiratorial whisper. “A moment of poor judgment. You can’t throw away your entire future over one silly mistake with a nobody. A smart woman, a strong woman, learns to look the other way for the greater good.”
There it is. The first jab. *You’re not smart. You’re not strong.* I can feel the rage coiling in my gut, a sleeping dragon stirring. I force it down. I need to be weak. I need her to feel powerful.
“The greater good?” My voice cracks. “What greater good is there than our marriage? Than his loyalty to me?”
“The merger, darling,” she says, as if explaining something very simple to someone very slow. “The future of Bishop Architecture and Thorne Corp. A legacy for our families. That is so much bigger than one little indiscretion.”
“So I was supposed to just swallow it? Pretend it didn’t happen?”
“You were supposed to handle it. Privately. You scold him, you make him buy you a ridiculous piece of jewelry, and then you forgive him. You hold the power. Instead, you gave it all away with that… performance.”
She gestures vaguely, as if describing my public breakdown is distasteful. Her gaze sweeps over my room and lands on a silver frame on my dresser. It’s a photo of me and my mother, taken years ago. My mother’s arm is around my shoulder, her smile genuine and bright.
Delilah gets up and walks over to it. She picks it up, her thumb stroking the glass over my mother’s face. “You’re so much like her, you know.”
I don’t answer.
“So sensitive,” she continues, her voice syrupy with false pity. “She felt everything so deeply. This world was hard on her, too. It requires a thicker skin, a certain… pragmatism. Emotion is a liability in our world, Rhea. You’re just not cut out for the pressure.”
The dragon in my gut breathes fire. She’s using my mother’s memory to call me weak. The same way she and her mother whispered about Eleanor Bishop being too fragile for Richard, too much of an artist and not enough of a shark. It’s their favorite narrative.
I let a tear slip down my cheek. A single, perfect drop of betrayal. “Maybe you’re right,” I whisper, my voice choked. “I’ve ruined everything, haven’t I? For everyone.”
She turns from the photo, a small, triumphant smile playing on her lips. She has me. She’s broken me. That’s what she thinks. She sets the photo down and comes back to the bed.
“No, no, it’s not ruined,” she says, her tone magnanimous. “It’s a mess, but it’s not completely ruined. I can fix it.”
“How?” I ask, looking up at her like she’s my savior.
“I’ll talk to Ellis,” she says, taking the teacup from my now-limp hands and placing it back on the tray. “I’ll smooth things over. He listens to me. I’ll explain that you were just overwrought. That you regret your little outburst. We’ll let the dust settle for a few weeks, and then we’ll quietly announce that you’ve reconciled.”
Her arrogance is breathtaking. She believes she can puppeteer every person in her orbit. My fiancé. My father. Me.
“You’d do that?” I ask, feigning a pathetic sort of hope.
“Of course I would. I’m your sister.” She gives my shoulder a firm squeeze. “I just want you to be happy. And your happiness is with Ellis, securing our family’s future. You just need to learn your place in all of this.”
*You are nothing without Ellis and me.* The message is crystal clear.
“Thank you, Delilah,” I manage to say. “I don’t know what I’d do without you.”
“I know,” she says softly. She gives me one last pitying look, a queen surveying a hopelessly lost pawn. “Just rest. Leave the thinking to me.”
She picks up the now-empty tray and glides out of the room, closing the door with a soft, final click. I am alone again.
For a full minute, I don’t move. I listen to her footsteps fade down the hall. I stare at the closed door. The fragile, heartbroken girl she just counseled dissolves like mist.
The trembling in my hands ceases. My breathing, once shallow and erratic, becomes slow and even. I stand up and walk to the mirror over my dresser.
The reflection shows a woman with red-rimmed eyes and a blotchy face. A victim. But the eyes looking back are not the eyes of a victim. They are as cold and hard as the diamond core of my rage.
Delilah thinks she’s fixing a mess. She has no idea she’s just armed me with exactly what I need: her complete and utter underestimation. She’s so busy looking down on me, she’ll never see the knife until it’s in her back.
I pick up the photo of my mother. My thumb strokes the glass, just as Delilah’s did.
“She thinks I’m you,” I whisper to the image. “She thinks I’m weak.”
A slow, dangerous smile spreads across my face in the mirror.
“Let her.”
