Chương 3
His expression held no curiosity.
Only concern.
Ben said, “We’re stopping.”
Olivia blinked.
“Stopping what?”
He looked at her.
“The wedding.”
A murmur moved through the ballroom.
Olivia stared at him as though he had spoken in another language.
“Ben.”
“We’re stopping.”
“You can’t make this decision because a four-year-old had something in her shoe.”
“No.”
He put his hand against the pocket containing the silver star.
“I’m making it because the woman I’m supposed to marry can’t tell me whether she lied to my dying mother.”
Olivia’s face finally broke.
Not dramatically.
Her lower lip trembled, and she bit it.
“Please don’t do this publicly.”
Ben almost said, You started publicly.
The line arrived complete in his mind, sharp enough for a movie.
He hated it immediately.
Real life had already become ugly enough.
He turned to Father James.
“I’m sorry.”
The priest nodded once.
“You don’t owe me an apology.”
Someone began crying quietly in the third row.
Not Olivia.
Ben’s Aunt Marlene.
Of course it was Marlene. She cried at supermarket openings if there were children cutting the ribbon.
The absurdity of the thought nearly unsteadied him.
He crouched again in front of Lucy.
“We’re going to get your shoe fixed.”
Lucy whispered, “Are you still getting married?”
Ben glanced at Olivia.
“No.”
Lucy considered this.
“Because of my shoe?”
Tessa made a broken sound.
Ben shook his head.
“No, sweetheart. Definitely not because of your shoe.”
She looked relieved.
“Okay.”
Then, with the practical seriousness of a child whose attention had reached its limit, she held up a crushed white rose.
“Can I keep this one?”
“Yes.”
“Two?”
“Take three.”
She gathered them into her arms.
Behind Ben, the ballroom began to fill with the low, uneasy noise of adults discovering they had no instructions for what came next.
The string quartet remained seated with instruments in their laps.
A server appeared in the service doorway holding a tray of champagne, took one look at the room, and backed out.
Ben stood.
“Tessa, I need to talk to you.”
Tessa looked at Olivia again.
That frightened him more than anything she had said.
“You don’t have to,” he added. “Not if you don’t want to.”
Tessa nodded after a moment.
“I want to.”
Olivia stepped between them.
“She has been waiting seven months to cause this.”
Tessa’s face reddened.
Ben said, “Move.”
Olivia looked at him.
He had never spoken to her that way.
Neither had his mother, probably. Margaret had preferred elaborate sentences when furious.
Olivia stepped aside.
Ben took Tessa and Lucy into the small library adjoining the ballroom.
Father James followed without being asked.
Ben was grateful for that.
He did not trust himself to understand anything alone.
The library smelled faintly of furniture polish and the lilies someone had placed on a side table. Lucy climbed onto a leather chair and began separating the petals from one of her roses.
Tessa remained standing.
Ben stayed near the door.
He wanted distance from everyone.
“How long did you work for my mother?”
“Fourteen months.”
“I knew you worked there.”
Tessa nodded.
He remembered seeing her.
That was the humiliating part.
He remembered Tessa opening the apartment door. Tessa carrying groceries. Tessa laughing once in the kitchen after Margaret made some comment about blueberries being proof that God did not care about shirt stains.
Ben had never learned her last name until the wedding paperwork.
He had categorized her as part of his mother’s apartment.
A person who existed when he arrived and disappeared when he left.
“I’m sorry,” he said.
Tessa looked confused.
“For what?”
“I should have known who you were.”
She shrugged in a way that suggested she did not have enough room for his guilt.
“It wasn’t about that.”
“Tell me what it was about.”
Tessa looked at Lucy.
“Baby, can you count the flowers for me?”
Lucy sighed.
“I already know there’s three.”
“Count the petals.”
“That’s too many.”
Father James sat beside her.
“I’ll help.”
Lucy regarded his collar.
“Are you in charge?”
“Rarely.”
That interested her enough.
Tessa moved farther from the chair.
Her voice dropped.
“Mrs. Hale and you had a bad argument.”
“Two weeks before she died.”
“She cried after.”
Ben looked at her.
His mother hated crying in front of people.
He tried to picture it and could not.
Tessa continued.
“She was angry too. I’m not saying she wasn’t. She said you were stubborn.”
“That sounds like her.”
“She also said you got it from her.”
Despite himself, Ben let out a short breath.
Tessa almost smiled.
Then it was gone.
“She told me she was going to call you the next morning.”
“She didn’t.”
“She tried.”
Ben did not move.
“Olivia came early that day. Around seven-thirty.”
“How do you know?”
“I was making oatmeal. Your mother hated the hospital oatmeal.”
“Cinnamon?”
Tessa looked surprised.
“And too much brown sugar.”
Ben stared at the carpet.
His mother had claimed brown sugar did not count if it dissolved.
He had forgotten that.
“Tessa.”
“Sorry.”
“No. Keep going.”
“Olivia said you were in meetings and your mother should rest. Mrs. Hale got angry. She said she would call you herself.”
“What happened?”
Tessa’s fingers twisted around the edge of her apron.
“Olivia took the phone.”
Father James looked up.
Ben felt the room sharpen.
“She took it?”
“She said Mrs. Hale was confused and needed to sleep. Your mother told her to give it back.”
“And you?”
“I was in the kitchen.”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
Tessa’s eyes dropped.
“I did nothing.”
There was no self-defense in the sentence.
Ben found that harder to hear than an excuse.
“She was my employer,” Tessa said. “Olivia was going to be her daughter-in-law. I thought it was family business. Then Mrs. Hale asked me later if you had called.”
Ben pressed his thumb into his palm.
“What did you say?”
“I said I didn’t know.”
May you like
“And Olivia?”
“She said you’d asked not to be contacted.”
