The Billionaire's Contract Wife

Chapter Five

The Perfect Wife

The Lancaster family dinner was held in a townhouse that cost more than most countries' foreign reserves. I arrived in a dress I'd designed myself — deep burgundy silk, structured shoulders, a neckline that suggested confidence without begging for attention.

I'd been briefed by Clara: Lancaster's mother had passed away years ago. His father, Richard, had remarried. Two board members and their wives. A handful of inner circle.

And Vanessa Blackwood.

I'd known she would be there. I hadn't known she would position herself at the door.

She was beautiful in the way that expensive things are beautiful — deliberate, maintained, designed to provoke. She extended her hand with a smile that reached nowhere near her eyes.

"Sophia. What a surprise this all was."

"For me too," I said pleasantly, and shook her hand.

She didn't move to let me pass. "We've all been wondering — how does it feel? To marry someone who didn't choose you for love?"

The room wasn't silent. But it was listening.

I looked at her for a long moment. Kept my face exactly as it was.

"The same way it feels," I said, "for every woman in this room, I imagine." I smiled. "Now, if you'll excuse me."

I moved past her. Kept my spine straight. Kept my hands still.

Don't count tiles, I told myself. Walk.

Dinner was a performance I was reasonably good at. I'd grown up in this world, or near enough to it. I knew which fork and which laugh and which silence. I spoke when spoken to and deflected the pointed questions with the precision of someone who has designed armor for a living.

But by the second course I felt it — the low, constant pressure of a room testing whether I belonged.

Then my phone, on silent in my bag, buzzed three times.

I excused myself to the hallway.

Lucas.

I answered.

"How is it going." Not quite a question.

"Fine." I kept my voice steady. "How did you—"

"James is there. He sends updates." A pause. "Vanessa."

"Handled."

A beat of silence. "Go back in," he said. "Put me on speaker."

"Lucas, that's not—"

"Sophia. Speaker."

I walked back to the table, phone in hand. Every eye tracked me.

"Forgive me," I said, taking my seat. "My husband wanted to say hello."

I set the phone on the table. His voice came through, clear and cool, filling the room the way his presence would have.

"Richard. Caroline. I'm sorry to miss the evening." A pause that felt deliberate. "Please make my wife comfortable. She is the most capable person in that room."

He hung up.

The table was very quiet for a moment.

Richard Lancaster — silver-haired, appraising — looked at me with something that was almost respect. "He doesn't call from London for nothing," he said.

"No," I agreed. "He doesn't."

I picked up my fork.

Across the table, Vanessa Blackwood's smile had gone rigid at the edges.

I didn't allow myself to feel anything about that.

Almost.