"Are you going to St Moritz at the end of the year?"

The Hales house in London. Dinner.

Unlike his two sons, who are abroad, Earl Rupert often ate with his daughter Isabella.

Tonight too a neat dinner and a bottle of wine stood on the long table.

The subject drifted naturally to the end-of-year schedule.

The royal families and the nobility of Europe. The winter social season, where the holders of old money and the people of the financial world come together in one place as a matter of course.

"I haven't decided yet."

Isabella cut a small piece off the fish and put it in her mouth.

In another year she would already have settled everything by now, from the schedule to the dress.

Isabella was going about this winter's season a little differently.

Rupert watched his daughter's face closely without saying anything.

Something was on her mind. That was not hard to notice.

"You know where the Atlas party is this year?"

Isabella's fork stopped.

"……St Moritz."

"That's right."

Rupert already knows it.

He meant this year's end-of-year invitation, which will go out to the people who hold an Atlas black card.

The place is St Moritz in Switzerland.

The official invitations have not gone out yet. But for a house like the Hales it is normal for the schedule to be shared in advance.

Isabella's face darkened very slightly.

"Then…… it'll go to Bear too."

"Of course."

Rupert's answer came fast and short, with no hesitation in it.

"He holds the top-grade Atlas black card you gave him."

"……." That is exactly the problem. This time it is not an occasion she takes him to at her own discretion.

Bear has already been given the standing to be invited on his own.

He is a guest whose name Atlas put on the list first.

Isabella played with the wine glass and in the end took her hand away.

"Why the face?"

"It's nothing."

"Your face says something entirely different."

Earl Rupert had been studying his daughter's expression, and he went on with the meal as though…