“I told you it wasn’t necessary,” he said.

“You didn’t say it was forbidden,” I answered.

His eyes dropped to Leo, and his jaw tightened.

“And why did you bring him?” Leo looked back up at his father, completely calm, and answered before I could.

“I’m your son,” he said, flatly.

“I figured I was invited to my dad’s big night.” I watched Julian swallow that, watched him understand that he could not send us away without a scene of his own making, and then watched him force the corporate smile back onto his face and sweep the two of us toward a table near the back of the room, as far from the center of his evening as he could manage.

He thought he was containing us.