James stood beside her, balancing a glass of wine and the nervous energy of a man caught between two worlds: the warm, supportive life he’d built with Jessica—and the cold, unpredictable world of his mother, Evelyn.
Evelyn arrived sharply at six, her heels clicking on the hardwood floor like punctuation marks. She greeted no one warmly, eyeing the room like a battlefield.
That should have been the first warning.
Dinner began stiffly, but as the wine flowed, the tension seemed to ease—until Evelyn cleared her throat and stood.
And what came next would change everything.
A Public Accusation, A Private Pain
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