The Call Boy I Met in Paris – Episode 8
“Who the fuck is Justin Lake?” Tony demanded, holding Sophie’s marriage certificate as though the unfamiliar name had personally insulted him. The room remained silent for a beat, every member of the Swift family staring at the man beside her. Justin met their scrutiny without the slightest discomfort.
Tony repeated the name more slowly. Something about it bothered him, a faint recognition he could not place beneath his anger. He had heard it before, perhaps in a business report or across a negotiating table, but the plainly dressed stranger in his living room did not fit the memory.
Stella found the connection first. Her eyes widened as she pointed at Justin. “Wait, is that the guy from this morning?”
She remembered the hotel corridor, the cash, and Sophie’s unapologetic expression after destroying her phone. The conclusion came easily because Sophie had already allowed her to believe it. “You married some random call boy?”
“What?” Karen, Stella’s mother, recoiled in theatrical horror. She looked Justin up and down, judging his worth from the clothes he wore and the profession Stella had assigned him. “That’s appalling.”
Sophie had spent years watching Karen claim moral authority she had never earned. “Not as appalling as you,” she replied. The certificate in Tony’s hand gave her a courage no threat could take away.
Karen’s mouth tightened, but Sophie was finished protecting the family’s preferred version of history. “At least I didn’t sleep with a married man and get pregnant,” she added, each word aimed at the affair that had helped destroy her mother’s marriage.
Stella surged forward. “Don’t you dare talk to my mother that way.” Her indignation would have been convincing if she had not repeated Karen’s betrayal by sleeping with Sophie’s fiancé.
Justin shifted closer to Sophie, not enough to take control of the confrontation, but enough to remind everyone that she was no longer standing alone. He could have ended their contempt with a sentence about his identity. Instead, he waited to see what Sophie would choose when defending him carried a cost.
Tony thrust the certificate toward her. “You need to file for divorce right now,” he ordered. His fury had little to do with Justin’s supposed occupation; Derek had been part of Tony’s plan, while this stranger could not be controlled.
Sophie looked at her father and felt something inside her finally become still. He had tolerated Derek’s betrayal, ignored Stella’s cruelty, and reduced her mother’s legacy to leverage. Yet he expected one command to undo the first decision Sophie had made entirely for herself.
“Or never set foot in this house again,” Tony continued. The ultimatum fell with the weight of every childhood warning he had ever used to keep her obedient.
Justin watched Sophie’s profile, ready to take her away if the threat wounded her more than she showed. Her expression did not crumble. Instead, a small, almost peaceful smile appeared.
“I’m okay with that,” she said. The answer shocked Tony into silence, and even Stella lost her practiced smirk.
Sophie took the certificate back from her father’s hand and smoothed the creased edge. “I was just here to show you my certificate.” She had not come seeking permission, forgiveness, or a place at their table.
Turning toward the door, she felt the first sting of what she had surrendered. Whatever this house had become, it still contained memories of her mother and the younger Sophie who had once hoped her father would choose her. Walking away did not erase that grief.
Justin placed a steadying hand at the small of her back. The gesture was subtle, but Tony noticed it. So did Derek, whose face darkened at the sight of another man protecting the woman he had assumed would always remain available to him.
“Sophie,” Tony called, expecting the old reflex to make her stop. She paused only long enough to look over her shoulder.
“In three days, the company will be mine,” she reminded him. “If you want to speak to me after that, make an appointment.”
She walked out with Justin beside her, leaving the Swift family staring after them. Behind the closing door, Tony looked again at the name on the marriage certificate, haunted by the certainty that Justin Lake was not as insignificant as he appeared.
