Chương 12
“No.”
She met his eyes.
“I think I’m finally seeing it in the correct order.”
Mark stopped.
Evelyn pointed toward the hallway.
“Take your papers and leave my house.”
Tara inhaled sharply.
“Evelyn, wait.”
“No.”
“If he leaves—”
“He leaves.”
“We could lose everything.”
Evelyn looked at her.
“No.”
Her voice stayed quiet.
“You could lose what you risked.”
Tara stared back.
Evelyn continued.
“You do not get to make my home the price of saving you from your own decision.”
Mark picked up the portfolio.
“Mrs. Price, I really think—”
“Evelyn.”
He stopped.
She pointed toward the stairs.
“Out.”
Mark looked at Tara.
Then Daniel.
Daniel moved aside, leaving the doorway clear.
Mark walked toward it.
At the threshold, he paused.
“The offer won’t remain open indefinitely.”
Evelyn almost laughed.
“It isn’t open now.”
He left.
They listened to his footsteps descend.
A few seconds later, the front door opened downstairs.
Then closed.
Tara sat on the edge of the bed.
Her face was empty.
Daniel stood near the window.
Patricia remained by the door.
Nobody spoke.
At last Tara whispered, “You just cost us twenty-four thousand dollars.”
Evelyn looked at her.
“No.”
The words came more gently than she expected.
“You did that before the turkey came out of the oven.”
Tara looked away.
Daniel did not.
For several seconds he studied his mother as if the sentence had opened a door he had spent years pretending was a wall.
Then he looked at Tara.
“We need to go downstairs.”
She wiped her cheeks.
“I’m not going down there.”
“Yes, you are.”
Her head snapped up.
“Why?”
“Because your family is sitting in Mom’s dining room waiting for dessert while you’re upstairs blaming her for money you hid from me.”
Patricia closed her eyes.
“Tara.”
“No.”
Tara stood.
“I am not walking downstairs so everybody can stare at me.”
Daniel’s voice hardened.
“They don’t know anything.”
“They know something.”
“Then we tell them Thanksgiving is over.”
Her face changed.
“You cannot throw my family out.”
Evelyn almost spoke, but Daniel did first.
“It isn’t your house.”
Tara stared at him.
The words seemed to shock him too.
His mouth tightened afterward, but he did not take them back.
Patricia turned toward the hallway.
“I’ll handle Jim.”
Tara looked at her mother.
“Handle him how?”
“I’ll tell him people need to go.”
“He’ll ask why.”
“He asks why the grocery store moves cereal.”
“That doesn’t mean he gets an answer.”
Patricia left before Tara could stop her.
Daniel loosened his tie completely and pulled it off.
For a moment he stood there holding it in one hand, looking like a man who had arrived home from the wrong funeral.
“We’re not discussing the marriage tonight,” he said.
Tara laughed bitterly.
“That’s generous.”
“We’re not.”
“You think you get to schedule this?”
“I think we need to get through the next hour without making it worse.”
“You already made it worse.”
Daniel stared at her.
“I did?”
“You sided with her.”
Evelyn felt the accusation move through the room.
Daniel looked tired rather than angry.
“I asked where our money went.”
“You embarrassed me in front of your mother.”
“You spent our savings on her house without asking either of us.”
Tara’s chin trembled.
“You never take risks.”
Daniel looked at her for a long time.
Then he nodded.
“You’re right.”
She blinked.
Evelyn did too.
Daniel continued.
“I don’t.”
His voice was quiet.
“I wait.”
“I avoid.”
“I tell myself things will sort out if I don’t make anybody mad.”
He looked at Evelyn.
“I did that with Mom.”
Then he looked back at Tara.
“And I did it with you.”
Tara’s expression softened a fraction.
Daniel shook his head.
“That doesn’t make what you did okay.”
The softness disappeared.
“I didn’t say it did.”
“You were about to.”
“You don’t know what I was about to say.”
“I know how this goes.”
“No.”
Tara’s voice cracked.
“You know how you think it goes.”
A shout rose from downstairs.
Jim’s voice.
“What do you mean we’re leaving?”
Patricia answered, too muffled to understand.
Another voice joined in.
Then another.
Evelyn closed her eyes.
Of course nobody would leave quietly.
Families rarely did anything quietly except resent one another.
“I’ll go,” she said.
Daniel turned.
“You don’t have to.”
“It is my house.”
Tara flinched at that.
Evelyn left the bedroom.
The staircase seemed longer than usual.
At the bottom, Patricia stood near the front door while Jim argued with her in a stage whisper loud enough for half the neighborhood to hear.
“I haven’t had pie.”
“You can have pie at home.”
“There are four pies in there.”
“I saw them.”
“We brought one.”
“We can take it.”
Jim noticed Evelyn and stopped.
The dining room had gone almost silent.
Twenty-one faces turned toward her.
Some looked curious.
Some concerned.
A few immediately looked away, which meant they knew enough to feel awkward.
Evelyn gripped the banister.
For one irrational moment she wanted to climb back upstairs.
Instead she walked into the dining room.
Tara’s ceramic turkey sat where her chair should have been.
Someone had moved the gravy boat beside it.
The sight nearly made her laugh.
“Thank you all for coming,” Evelyn said.
No one replied.
A fork touched a plate somewhere near the far end.
Evelyn continued.
“I’m afraid we’re going to end the evening earlier than planned.”
Chelsea, who was apparently one of the twenty-two-year-old children assigned to the nonexistent kids’ table, looked at Tara’s sister.
Jim frowned.
“Everything okay?”
“No emergency.”
That seemed to relax several people.
Evelyn added, “Just a family matter that needs some privacy.”
Tara entered behind her.
The room shifted immediately.
Eyes moved to her swollen face.
One of her sisters stood.
“What happened?”
“Nothing.”
Tara’s answer came too fast.
Her sister looked at Daniel, who had followed her down.
Daniel shook his head slightly.
“Not tonight.”
That should have ended it.
May you like
It did not.
Jim pointed toward the hallway.
