Chapter 2

The moment Dad heard I wanted a divorce, his voice turned urgent.

“Sweetheart, did Ethan do something to hurt you?”

“Where is he? I’ll deal with him myself!”

I answered calmly.

“He gave his secretary a year of paid leave.”

“Do you know what that means?”

Dad was clearly taken aback.

“Did I hear you correctly? You want to divorce him because he gave an employee a year of paid leave?”

Beside me, Ethan couldn’t resist interrupting.

“It’s just a prize. A year off with pay. It’s not like the company can’t afford it. Did you really have to drag your dad into this?”

I didn’t even look at him. I kept talking to Dad.

“Dad, remember when you and Mom were building your business in Westport? Mom took a year off too.”

Dad understood instantly. His voice exploded with rage.

“So that’s what this is. Ethan actually dared to give his secretary a year of paid leave. I’ll make the arrangements right now.”

“If he’s really done something like that, I’ll make sure he can never show his face in business again!”

Ethan heard the anger coming through the phone.

He quickly grabbed it from me to explain.

“Dad, you’ve misunderstood. Sophie’s year of paid leave was a prize in our company’s Thanksgiving holiday raffle.”

“You’re always saying strong company performance comes from employees’ hard work. I organized a raffle to liven things up and reward everyone. What’s wrong with that?”

“Claire’s probably just jealous that Sophie won. She got upset and started talking about divorce. I’ll calm her down. Please don’t take what she said about divorce and cutting off our funding seriously.”

The employees nearby called out to Dad as well.

“That’s right, Mr. Bennett! We all picked our own turkey boxes. The winners were completely random.”

“The prizes vary in value, but everyone’s really happy with how generous they are.”

“I put the tickets in the bags myself, completely at random. It was absolutely fair. Whoever won the big prizes just got lucky.”

Their chorus seemed to shake Dad’s resolve.

Ethan took my hand.

“Claire, have you misunderstood something? I haven’t played favorites.”

“If I favor anyone, it’s you.”

“Please stop talking about divorce. If you’re unhappy, I’ll get you a surprise gift box every day. How does that sound?”

I shook off his hand and pointed at the woman who’d claimed she’d packed the tickets herself.

“Random? Then tell me, what did you win?”

“Don’t tell me you just happened to randomly pick one of the big prizes you packed yourself.”

Everyone turned to look at her.

I lowered my eyes and noticed the gold good-luck charm on her bracelet. Sophie was wearing an identical one.

That explained it.

She was Sophie’s best friend, Megan Brooks, head of the planning department.

Ethan had put her in charge of organizing this event. Rigging the raffle would have been child’s play.

Megan’s voice sounded distinctly guilty.

“…Second prize.”

“What was second prize?” I pressed.

She instinctively glanced at Sophie, then Ethan. She clearly had something to hide.

“Six months of paid leave.”

I burst out laughing.

“What wonderful best friends. Even your big raffle wins come as a matching set.”

I stared straight at Megan.

“You said you personally put the raffle tickets into the bags?”

Megan shrank back half a step and didn’t dare answer.

Sophie stepped forward.

“I trust Megan. She would never cheat.”

“Do we deserve to be attacked just because we were both lucky enough to win?”

Ethan frowned.

“What is wrong with you today, Claire? You’re upset that Sophie won. You’re upset that I gave you the grand prize. And now you’re picking apart Megan’s prize too?”

“Nobody else has a problem with the results. Why won’t you let this go?”

The others nodded in agreement.

“Exactly. I’m usually unlucky, so I’m thrilled with my thousand-dollar holiday bonus. Thank you, Mr. Hayes! You’re so generous!”

“Statistically, anything can happen. You can’t make a rule that whoever packs the tickets isn’t allowed to win a big prize.”

After hearing everyone, Dad tried to reason with me too.

“Claire, have you misunderstood something? This doesn’t sound deliberate to me. Maybe it really was a coincidence, and you’re overthinking it.”

I forced down my anger and spoke firmly.