Page 9 of The Vow

There was a veritable army of people who had access to information simply because they went unseen, and though I didn’t know it then, that knowledge would benefit me in the upcoming years.

While working on the janitorial team, Mrs. Sinclair would come to the building every so often. Her fashion sense and elegant accent made her stand out from most. I never caught more than her comings and goings, but one day, that coming and going sparked a conversation between the two suited men who decided to wait outside the office doors for her to return, bitching about having to take “the wife” to her yoga class.

The way they complained about having to take her, where they had to take her, how long they had to be there…it was shocking how easily they volunteered the information while I stood right there, making the glass windows sparkle.

I thought I’d have to do a lot worse than join a yoga studio to get the information I was looking for, so I was more than happy to sweat and stretch if it would give me a way in.

Until that first class, I fully expected the wife of the man Iconsidered to be the worst human in the world to be…just like her husband. Sly. Deceptive. Despicable. That notion shattered the moment Sandrine took my hand and pulled me close, air-kissing one side of my face and then the other, greeting me with the lull of her French accent.

She was nothing like her husband. She was vibrant and energetic. Even when we were dripping sweat at the end of class, she always stayed and chatted about life, almost as though she wasn’t quite ready to return to hers. Not that she didn’t enjoy the perks of being Mrs. Sinclair.

Sandrine loved fashion and jewelry. Her fingers and wrists always glittered when she got to the studio. While she removed her jewelry for class, she still always wore it to the building, and it was the first thing she put on when she was done.

Every time I looked at those diamonds, all I thought was that they were worth more than the amount of money her husband had stolen from me, and the bitterness in my gut intensified.

Day after day, I made a point to converse with her more—to listen and latch onto the things I could tell she loved to talk about; the biggest one being her young daughter, Daria. If Sandrine was to be believed, the girl was a piano prodigy. To my dismay, only rarely did she bring up Sinclair, and it was always in an offhand comment about his work, how he was working, or that she had yet another party to organize for his work colleagues. The pulse of her enjoyment seemed to begin and end with the task of planning a party.

Even with her gregarious personality, it took weeks of conversation—of becoming the story I told—before she invited me over for dinner. It wasn’t lost on me that the conversation that tipped the bucket was when I shared that I didn’t go out much because I was getting over an abusive relationship with an ex who continued to stalk me even after we’d broken up,showing up in public places to make sure I wasn’t seeing anyone else.

It was a complete fabrication. I didn’t have an ex. With my brothers serving overseas in the military, the only man currently in my life was the one who’d destroyed it: her husband. But a well-placed lie worked as well as a dozen truths, and the way her head tipped and her eyes slightly widened, the way her string of thoughts seemed to break for just a moment, the lie had struck the perfect chord.

So here I was, walking into the home of my enemy, about to sit at his table and share a meal with the man who’d stolen from me. Even though he’d convinced me to invest a fortune (at least, to me) with him, I’d never met Magnus Sinclair in person. Aside from that one phone call we shared, the only times I’d seen him were at a distance or in a rare photograph.

“Here, let me take your jacket, chérie.” The endearment rolled off her tongue as she lifted my leather coat from my shoulders.

As she hung it in the closet, I took the moment to look at her; she looked so different from the makeup-free woman in yoga class.

Tonight, she glittered in a one-sleeved royal purple dress, the silk reaching all the way to the floor. Her hair was pulled up into a French knot, and she wore more makeup that drew out the dark shade of her eyes. If I looked close enough, I swore I could see the faint hint of red peeking out from underneath her eyeliner.Had she been crying?

“Oh,très chic.” Her hand flitted over my tight black dress, distracting me. “It’s perfect. So perfect.”

When I’d accepted her invitation, it had been immediately followed by a declaration that we had to go shopping. So, yesterday afternoon, I met her and her daughter at one of theupscale malls in the city, trying on dresses that cost more than my rent, and buying one that cost an entire week’s pay.

Sandrine tried to pay for it along with her and Daria’s things, but I refused. I could tell my refusal truly hurt her, but I wouldn’t relent. I could stomach her hurt better than I could accept that the money that would’ve paid for the dress was money that was stolen from me.

Over the past weeks, Sandrine had come to look at me as…a project. It was a cold term, but it was the only one that fit. I was equidistant in age between her and her daughter, so I was too old for her to see as another child, but too young and too new of an acquaintance for her to see me as a sister. Friend would be the obvious choice, but Sandrine Sinclair didn’t have friends. Not the way her husband closely guarded her life and the people she let in it.

So, I was a project. Sandrine liked projects. Maybe because projects made her feel like her life wasn’t a prison. After weeks of getting to know her, there was no doubt in my mind that Sandrine was a vibrant, passionate, beautiful, good woman tied to an evil man, and I both admired her tenacity to be able to continue to shine and pitied her for it.

“He won’t be able to look away from you in that dress,chérie.”

“He—who?” I balked as she looped her arm through mine and guided us through the gleaming maze of massive rooms in the mansion.

She couldn’t mean Sinclair. That wouldn’t be…real. I couldn’t have misjudged her so poorly?—

“Don’t be angry with me, chérie, but there’s someone here for dinner that I wanted you to meet.” She beamed at me, patting my arm as she spoke. “He’s an associate of my husband’s but a true gentleman. True, I promise you. I’ve metmany men in my life—Frenchmen, Englishmen, Italians, Americans, but this one…he’ll put that ex of yours to shame.”

Suddenly, her exuberance over this dress when I’d tried it on in the store grounded itself in purpose. The padded shoulders accentuated the V that cut deep on my chest and back, putting both my sternum and spine on display. The material clung to my waist and hips and ass, all the way down to mid-calf. An effortless combination of seductive and classy. And now I knew why she’d demanded I buy it for this dinner.

She was trying to set me up.

I wanted to be angry, but I really had no grounds. After all, I was here to try and find incriminating evidence that her husband was a fraud. A criminal.

“Sandrine, I?—”

“Please, chérie,” she begged, turning in front of me and stopping. “Just give Damon a chance. If the spark isn’t there, then it isn’t there, but if it is…” Something shimmered in her eyes. “Damon is a close associate of Magnus—a consultant to his business. If you were together, then my husband would accept you in my life easier. He would accept my friend easier.”

My throat tightened.Maybe I wasn’t a project after all.But I doubted I’d ever be a friend. Not when she realized what I’d come here to do…and how I’d used her.

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