Jonathan did not go home at once. He told the driver to circle the block until the noise in his head dropped. It did not drop. The music from the gym still pounded under his skin. The word Emma had said—one small, plain no—kept landing and landing like a hammer on the same spot.
“Home, sir?" the driver asked again.
“Yes," Jonathan said. His voice was calm. He was not calm.
The house staff lined the entry as they always did. He nodded without seeing faces. He went straight to his study and shut the door. The room was quiet; the quiet made it worse. He stared at the shelves his mother had arranged when he was a child. The porcelain set he had collected over the years sat in a glass cabinet. He had bought pieces one by one during trips with his father—small victories he could point to when
