“That seat is for blood relatives.”
My son stopped beside the empty space at the table.
He was holding the little brass napkin ring my mother let him polish that afternoon.
Eight years old.
A navy jacket.
A name card that had been moved to the sideboard.
“But I always sit here.”
Camilla adjusted a glass without looking at him.
“Tonight is different.”
I stood at the dining-room doorway.
For a moment, I thought I had misunderstood.
Then Theo looked toward the service door.
A smaller table had been arranged beyond it.
One plate.
One glass.
One chair.
My son’s chair.
“Put it back,” I said.
Camilla turned.
“What?”
“My son’s chair.”
Her expression tightened.
“Roman, we discussed making this evening more appropriate.”
“We discussed the menu.”
“It’s a family dinner.”
“Yes.”
She looked at Theo, then back at me.
“That is precisely the point.”
My mother lowered her fork.
Until then, Vivian had been listening quietly from the other end of the table.
She was seventy-two and had never needed volume to make people regret being careless.
“What point, Camilla?”
My fiancée straightened.
“Someone needs to protect the family.”
My mother looked toward my son.
“From an eight-year-old?”
Theo’s fingers closed around the napkin ring.
I crossed the room.
He looked up before I reached him.
“Was I your son before she came?”
The question hit harder than the missing chair.
I crouched beside him.
“You were my son before she came.”
His eyes searched mine.
“And you still are.”
Across the table, my mother set down her napkin.
“Roman isn’t my blood either.”
Camilla stared at her.
“I adopted him when he was six.”
Nobody moved.
