Ava Vitiello POV
Liam looked as though he wished the floor would crack open and swallow him whole.
Sarah marched across the room, her worn-down heels clicking unevenly against the pristine marble.
"You told me you were working late!" she screamed, shoving Liam hard in the chest. "You told me you had a shift!"
Liam grabbed her wrists, his panic visible. He looked around wildly at the hundreds of eyes watching them—the Dons, the Capos, the wives dripping in diamonds.
"Sarah, please," he hissed. "Not here."
She ripped her hands away.
"Don't you shush me!" she yelled. "I know why you're here. I checked your GPS. You came to see her!"
She pointed a shaking finger directly at me.
I stood perfectly still, the calm in the center of their storm.
Chloe was sobbing now. "Mommy, please, can we go home?"
"Shut up, Chloe!" Sarah snapped.
She reached down and pinched the girl's arm viciously. "Cry louder so he feels bad."
A collective gasp rippled through the room at the sheer cruelty of it.
Liam looked trapped. He turned to me, his eyes begging for help. Begging for me to intervene like I used to. To fix his messes.
I merely raised an eyebrow.
This is the cage you built, Liam, I thought. Enjoy the bars.
Sarah turned her full attention to me. She stepped closer, invading my personal space, radiating the scent of stale perfume and desperation.
"You think you're so special, don't you?" she spat. "Standing there in your fancy dress."
"I think I'm attending a birthday party, Sarah," I said coolly. "You seem to be attending a mental breakdown."
She laughed, a manic, brittle sound.
"You have nothing," she said. "You have money, sure. But you're empty. You're thirty-five and you're alone."
She grabbed Chloe and shoved the poor girl forward.
"I gave him a family!" she screamed. "I gave him a daughter! What did you ever give him besides orders?"
The room fell so quiet you could almost hear the ice melting in the champagne buckets.
Liam looked down at his shoes, trembling.
Sarah was winding up for the kill shot. She wanted to hurt me. She wanted to prove that despite her poverty, despite her misery, she had won the womanhood lottery.
She took a deep breath.
"He hates you, you know," she whispered, loud enough for the front row to hear. "He tells me every night how cold you were. Like sleeping with a statue."
I set my glass down on a passing waiter's tray with a gentle clink.
"Are you finished?" I asked.
