Page 133 of The Sinner's Sanctuary

I nod.

“And Marianne’s helping out with this somehow?”

Olivier sounds slightly clueless, so no major alarms are going off, but I don’t like the fact that my wife is being associated with the Lawther’s divorce, as ugly as it could potentially get.

“You mentioned Avery’s the one who’s been talking,” I say.

“Just between you and me—I’ve known about your marriage awhile, but not because it’s open knowledge or anything—it’s because Elodie—she had a fewsessionsor whatever you want to call them with Marianne a while back.”

“Ah.” At least half of my perceived masculinity disappears like a puff of smoke. “She must’ve been very young, then.”

“She was twenty-one,” Olivier says.

I nod slowly, taking this in. Elodie is probably around twenty-seven, twenty-eight now. So well within the timeline of our open marriage. I shouldn’t be shocked, or annoyed, but I’m both.

“El knows a lot of women who’ve been with Marianne,” he adds.

I try to sound unmoved. “Bored wives and rebellious heiresses, I’m assuming?”

“That’s kind of what it seems like.”

The assistants Marianne usually tries to stick me with are the heiress types, trying to get out from under their families’ thumbs.

“Except for Avery,” Olivier says.

“In what way?”

“This is gonna sound so intrusive, and I apologize, but do you have a prenup?”

There goes an alarm. I stiffen. “We do.”

One that heavily protects Marianne because she was the heiress when I married her. The fortune I’ve amassed has been during the course of our marriage, the initial investment in my business having come from her family who fucking adore me. “It’s complicated,” I add. The idea of her plotting againstme, which is the vibe I’m getting, is deeply concerning.

But I always knew something was different about Avery, didn’t I? Especially over the last year. Marianne doesn’t makefriends. She entertains and toys with young women, but in terms of trusting someone and forming bonds, that ability seems to be as stunted as her ability to express physical affection with me.

But perhaps it’s only men who render her incapable. Because she hates men. Believes they’re weak creatures of impulse trying to overcome deep-seated feelings of impotence—all of them—all ofus. What she planned for Graham Lawther was arguably the most extreme, but she’s been using me to cut off powerful men at the knees for years.

Her stated reason for this, whenever I’ve questioned her, is she wants me to be the most successful, the most powerful. The most untouchable. And I’m a perfect weapon because I’m good at what I do and possess a ruthless streak of my own. It’s never mattered to me who I beat to a deal or outbid, only that I come out on top for the good of my own company and fortune. Marianne’s pleasure is the reward, and since all other paths for me to please her are closed, it’s always felt good to bring home a prize for her, her chosen enemy’s head on a silver platter, for example.

I’m wary of Olivier’s expression. It borders on pity.

“Are you telling me her relationship with Avery should concern me?” I ask.

“Senator Lawther was living with Silas for more than two years. There’s no way she just found out. She’s known.”

“Do you know that for a fact?”

“I mean—I’m pretty sure I’d know something was wrong if Drew stopped living with me all of a sudden.”

“He’s a U.S. Senator. Don’t they all spend half the year in D.C.? Or traveling? Why are you so sure she knew?”

“Because Avery’s not as stupid as she looks,” he says.

I press my lips shut. I wouldn’t call Avery stupid. Vapid, perhaps. Shallow. But I don’t see her behind closed doors. I’ve never had a conversation with her beyond a short exchange at a cocktail party or charity event. As I recall from one of those, she went to Brown. No recollection of whether she graduated, or ifshe did, what her degree was in. But as a senator’s wife, I know she doesn’t work now.

Still, there’s been no indication from Marianne that she’s thinking of leaving me. Granted, things have been distant between us, more so than usual, since she rejected my pathetic invitation to Palm Beach, but she mobilized when I needed her for Fischer and expressed genuine concern for our old friend. I can’t believe she hatesmeenough to pursue an ugly divorce to run off and be with Avery Lawther, assuming that’s where Olivier is going with all this.

“Is this a feeling you have or is there something you’re not telling me?” I ask.

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