Chapter 2 - The Dining Room Ambush
The formal dining room looked like a museum exhibit designed by someone who hated comfort. A massive mahogany table stretched twenty feet across the room beneath a crystal chandelier, polished to such a high gloss that Claire could see her own reflection as she walked in.
At the far end, Adrian sat like a king presiding over a lonely kingdom. The triplets sat on the left side of the table, leaving a single, isolated chair directly opposite them.
As Claire pulled out the chair and sat down, she noticed the subtle tension in the room. Mrs. Gable was serving a steaming platter of roast beef and potatoes, her hands trembling slightly as she set the silver bowls down.
“Eat,” Adrian commanded quietly, cutting into his steak without looking up.
Claire picked up her fork. She took one bite of the potatoes, then stopped. Her palate, refined by years of running a hotel kitchen and cooking for her own daughter, caught it immediately.
Salt. An absolute mountain of salt.
She looked across the table. Noah, Caleb, and Miles were watching her with breathless anticipation, their forks hovering near their mouths, waiting for the explosion.
Claire didn't cough. She didn't spit it out. She calmly picked up her glass of ice water, took a long sip to wash away the briny shock, and set the glass back down with a soft clink.
“Well?” Caleb finally blurted out, unable to contain his curiosity. “Does it taste good?”
Claire looked directly at Caleb, her expression completely deadpan. “It tastes like the Atlantic Ocean decided to colonize my dinner plate.”
The boys stared at her, stunned.
“My grandmother’s cooking in Queens had more subtlety,” Claire continued, casually buttering a dinner roll. “If you’re going to sabotage the kitchen staff, boys, you need to use something less obvious than a full container of table salt. Try cayenne pepper next time. It burns the tongue before they can identify the sodium.”
Mrs. Gable let out a sudden, explosive snort, quickly converting it into a cough and hurrying back toward the kitchen doors.
Adrian stopped chewing. He lowered his knife and fork, his sharp eyes darting from his sons to Claire. A dangerous, unreadable silence descended upon the table.
“Did you tamper with the food?” Adrian asked, his voice dropping an octave as he addressed the triplets.
Miles, the quietest of the three, looked down at his plate, muttering, “We just wanted to see if she’d cry like the last one.”
“The last one cried because she lacked imagination,” Claire said smoothly, meeting Adrian’s intense gaze across the candlelight. “I grew up with three older brothers in a house with one bathroom. A little kitchen sabotage is amateur hour.”
Adrian stared at her for a long, agonizing moment. Then, slowly, the tension in his broad shoulders eased. He picked up his glass of wine, took a sip, and looked back at his sons.
May you like
“Finish your vegetables,” Adrian instructed them coldly. “And tomorrow, you will apologize to Mrs. Gable and prepare a proper meal for Miss Donovan yourselves.”
The triplets’ jaws dropped in unison.
