Not in any way you could subpoena. No raised voices, no obvious conflict. Just a subtle shift in posture, volume, and movement—the kind of thing you learned to clock in a courtroom before someone objected.
René was there.
He stood beside Rachel’s chair, coat still on, one hand resting on the back of it like it was a deposition prop he’d claimed. He was speaking in low, precise French, each sentence clipped and controlled.
Rachel had gone still in that way people do when they’re listening under pressure.
I slowed automatically.
René turned his head and looked at me.
Not hostile. Not friendly.
Evaluating.
The same look I gave opposing counsel when they walked in with a smile that didn’t reach their eyes.
Ah.
Master Grumpy, Esquire.
I remembered him from my last trip—same posture, same expression, same permanent air of a man who had never once lost an argument and did not intend to start now.
His gaze flicked to the bag in my hand.
Evidence.
“Lunch,” I said, because I am very good at stating obvious facts under scrutiny.
Rachel glanced over, relief crossing her face, and said something to René in French—fast, fluid, effortless—before switching back to English.
“Oh—this is Dominic. My boyfriend.”
The word buoyed me, particularly with howshesaid it. Didn’t matter which language she spoke, she was claiming me.
René looked back at me. Longer this time, as though he wasn’t sure what to categorize me under, despite Rachel’s introduction.
I barely noticed.
I was still stuck on the way French slid out of her mouth like it belonged there. Not practiced. Not careful. Just… natural. Like this version of her had always existed and I was only now being allowed to see it.
“Dominic,” he repeated, testing the name like a clause he might strike.
I nodded. “René. We’ve met. Briefly.”
He inclined his head a fraction. Not a greeting. An acknowledgment of record. “You are visiting,” he said.
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
I glanced at Rachel. “Still under negotiation.”
That earned me the faintest twitch of his mouth. The legal equivalent of a smirk.
“Do not steal her for too long,” he said. “She is already behind.”
Rachel started to object. “René?—”
