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“I remember.”

“Good. Then you remember how chaotic it was after the announcement. People staring. Whispering. Pretending not to look at her while doing nothing else.” His fingers tap once against the edge of his desk. “Maggie was overwhelmed.”

“She had every right to be.”

“Yes,” he says softly. “And you noticed.”

My jaw tightens before I can stop it.

He sees it. Of course he sees it.

“You followed her,” Alester says.

“No.”

“No?”

“I checked on her.”

“An interesting distinction.”

“She was distressed.”

“She was pregnant, publicly introduced, and surrounded by strangers dissecting her like a legal clause. Distress was expected.” His voice remains calm, which somehow makes it worse. “What was not expected was you disappearing after her.”

Petra’s eyes shift to me. I hate that she’s hearing this. I hate the way Alester is laying it out piece by piece, not because he needs answers, but because he wants to watch me decide which lie to choose.

“I didn’t disappear after her,” I say.

Alester tilts his head. “You walked down the east corridor five minutes after she left the ballroom.”

“That house has many corridors.”

“And yet you chose the one that led to the blue sitting room.”

My pulse doesn’t move. I make sure of it.

But I remember Maggie in that room, one hand pressed over her mouth as she tried to breathe through the panic. Her dress pale under the low light. Her eyes too bright. The party roaring faintly beyond the walls while she stood there like a girl trying not to collapse inside someone else’s life.

I remember closing the door behind me.

Alester watches me with unnerving patience. “I saw the two of you go in,” he says.

The words are quiet.

Petra stills completely.

I look at Alester. “You saw me enter a room where my patient was upset.”

“Patient,” he repeats, amused. “How useful that word has become for you.”

“It is the correct word.”

“No. It is the safest word.” He walks slowly around the desk, never taking his eyes off me. “You were not thinking like her doctor when you went into that room.”

“You don’t know what I was thinking.”

“I know what I saw when the door opened again.”