The cocktail party was Titan's idea. A 'family gathering,' he called it. Forty people in a room that cost more than most people's houses, drinking wine that cost more than my first car.
I wore cream. A silk blouse I'd bought myself three years ago, before the Gray family money made everything feel like a costume. I stood near the window with a glass of sparkling water and watched the room the way I'd learned to watch rooms — quietly, from the edges, cataloging everything.
Sasha arrived at eight-fifteen.
She came in on the arm of a man Cullen introduced as 'an old family friend,' which meant nothing and everything. She wore burgundy. Of course she did. Her hair was perfect. Her laugh was the kind that made men turn their heads.
Cullen's eyes found her the moment she walked in. He didn't look for me first. I noted that.
I moved through the room. I smiled at Titan's business associates. I refilled my water glass. I was standing near the fireplace, mid-conversation with Cullen's aunt about a gallery opening, when Sasha materialized at my elbow.
'Marlee.' Her voice was warm honey. 'I love that blouse. Is it vintage?'
Before I could answer, she reached past me — a gesture that looked like she was pointing at something on the mantle — and her glass tipped.
Red wine, full glass, directly onto my chest.
The room went quiet in that particular way rooms do when everyone is pretending not to look.
'Oh my God.' Her hand flew to her mouth. Her eyes went wide and liquid. 'I'm so sorry, I'm so clumsy, I didn't — here, let me—' She grabbed a cocktail napkin and pressed it against my blouse with the kind of frantic helpfulness that made it impossible to step back without looking difficult.
I stood perfectly still.
'It's fine,' I said. My voice was even. 'Excuse me.'
I walked to the guest bedroom on the second floor. I took off the blouse, rinsed my hands, and stood in front of the mirror for a moment. The wine had spread across the silk in a dark, irreversible bloom.
A housekeeper brought me a borrowed dress. Navy. Two sizes too large. I put it on, belted it with a scarf from my purse, and went back downstairs.
Cullen was laughing at something Sasha had said. He glanced at me when I reappeared, registered the dress, and looked away again.
I found a corner of the room, took out my phone, and noted the time. 8:34 PM. Then I put my phone away and finished the party.
---
The weeks after that had a pattern to them.
At breakfast, Cullen was attentive. He poured my coffee. He asked about my day. He was performing, and he was good at it, and I let him perform.
At dinner, Sasha's work was visible in the architecture of the room.
The seating arrangements shifted first. A 'mix-up' placed me at the far end of the table while Sasha took the chair beside Cullen. I watched Titan's wife accept this without comment. I watched Cullen unfold his napkin and reach for the bread basket without looking up.
I ate my dinner. The lamb was good. I asked Cullen's uncle about his sailing trip to the Vineyard and listened to the whole answer.
Later, I opened my sketchbook and drew the table from memory. Twelve seats. I labeled each one and wrote three lines of annotation beside each name. What they said. What they didn't say. Who they looked at when they thought no one was watching.
The week after that, Cullen's cousin mentioned, carefully, that she'd heard Marlee had a difficult childhood. 'Sasha mentioned — I mean, she was just concerned. She cares about the family.'
I smiled. 'That's kind of her,' I said.
I wrote that down too.
---
The east drawing room shared a thin wall with Cullen's study.
I discovered this on a Tuesday evening when I heard his voice clearly through the plaster — low, intimate, the particular register he used when he thought he was alone. I stood very still. Then I took out my phone, opened the voice recorder, and set it on the shelf behind a stack of art books.
I left the room. I went to the kitchen. I made tea.
Forty minutes later I retrieved the phone. I listened through my earbuds with the volume low. His voice. Sasha's name, three times. A laugh I hadn't heard him use in years.
I encrypted the file. I forwarded it to Delia from the East Village library the next morning, along with the cross-referenced timestamps from his dinner phone checks and the screenshots I'd pulled from Sasha's public social media — location tags that placed her at the same hotel as Cullen on four separate weekends.
Delia replied in two words: *Received. Clean.*
I closed the browser. Cleared the history. Walked back out into the November cold.
The file count was growing.
I just had to keep being invisible a little while longer.
