Chương 3
Margaret looked at her daughter.
Elena’s throat moved. “The photographs are canceled.”
Her voice barely reached the door.
Adrian heard it anyway.
“Are you feeling ill?”
“No.”
“Then what’s wrong?”
Elena looked at the marks reflected behind her.
“I need more time,” she said.
His answer came gently. “We discussed that.”
Margaret felt Elena retreat without moving.
She stepped closer to the door. “The fitting needs more time, Adrian. Go downstairs.”
When he replied, the softness was gone, though his voice remained even. “This is my house.”
“And that is my daughter.”
The distinction hung between them.
At last, his footsteps moved away.
Margaret waited until she could no longer hear them. Then she turned to Elena.
“Get dressed.”
This time, Elena took the garment bag.
Inside the alterations room, the lights were harsher and the walls undecorated. Bolts of fabric stood in one corner beside a steam press. Elena closed the door but did not lock it. Margaret heard the faint movement of lace, then nothing for so long that she nearly knocked.
Nadia carried the ice bucket to a cabinet and returned with a dustpan. “There may be smaller pieces.”
“Leave them.”
“Someone could be cut.”
Margaret looked at her.
Nadia gave a small shrug. “A room can hold two problems.”
She swept beneath the platform. The ordinary motion steadied the air.
“Have you seen those marks before?” Margaret asked.
“No.”
“Has she said anything to you?”
Nadia hesitated.
Margaret moved closer. “Please.”
“At the second fitting, she asked whether we could raise the back.”
“When?”
“Six weeks ago.”
“What did she say?”
“That she had become self-conscious.”
“And did you raise it?”
“I began a removable lace panel. Mr. Bellamy saw the sketch.”
Margaret’s skin prickled. “Why would he see it?”
“He came to every fitting except the first.”
Margaret had found that attentive. She remembered telling Elena how lucky she was. Daniel had refused even to choose his own tie for their wedding.
“What did Adrian say about the panel?”
“That it changed the dress.”
“Did Elena still want it?”
“She said it didn’t matter.”
Nadia swept another shard into the dustpan. “At the next fitting, she asked if I had thrown the panel away.”
“Had you?”
“No.”
“Where is it?”
Nadia looked toward a row of labeled garment boxes. “Still here.”
The alterations-room door opened. Elena emerged in her trousers and blouse, carrying the wedding gown over both arms. Without the dress, she looked younger and more exhausted. The marks disappeared beneath the fabric of her blouse.
Nadia took the gown.
Elena glanced at the garment boxes. “You kept it?”
Nadia did not pretend to misunderstand. “I keep everything until the wedding.”
“Why?”
“Brides change their minds.”
A faint sound escaped Elena. It might have been a laugh if it had contained any amusement.
Nadia opened a box and removed a piece of lace shaped to cover most of the gown’s open back. Tiny seed pearls had been sewn along the edges.
Margaret touched it with one finger. “You made this after Elena told you it didn’t matter?”
“People say things don’t matter when they matter very much.”
Nadia folded the panel and placed it inside the garment bag with Elena’s veil. “The service elevator is through here.”
They crossed the alterations room and entered a narrow corridor smelling of starch, coffee, and the lemon cleaner used on old wood. The grandeur of Bellamy House vanished within six steps. Exposed pipes ran along the ceiling. A laundry cart blocked part of the passage, heaped with white tablecloths for the rehearsal dinner.
Elena stopped beside it. “My phone.”
“Where is it?” Margaret asked.
“In the fitting room. On the sofa.”
“I’ll get it.”
“No.”
“Elena—”
“He knows my location.”
Margaret understood. “We turn it off.”
“He’ll know I turned it off.”
“Yes.”
Elena closed her eyes briefly. “You make everything sound so simple.”
“It is not simple. It is necessary.”
“That’s what he says.”
The words landed with almost no force, which made them worse.
Margaret stepped back.
Elena looked immediately ashamed. “I didn’t mean—”
“Yes, you did.”
“No, I meant that he—”
“I know what you meant.”
Margaret considered the locked fitting room, the phone on the sofa, the way she had already issued instructions, taken charge, decided the route and destination. Her anger had found the nearest available body and called itself protection.
She took a breath.
“What do you want to do about the phone?”
Elena leaned against the wall. The service corridor lights flattened the color in her face.
“I want it,” she said. “I don’t want him to think he can keep it.”
“Then we’ll get it.”
“We?”
“You can go. I can go. Nadia can bring it. Your choice.”
Elena looked at Nadia.
“I can bring it,” Nadia said. “No one notices a seamstress carrying things.”
“That isn’t true,” Elena said.
Nadia’s expression changed slightly.
Elena shook her head. “Sorry. That sounded terrible.”
“It sounded honest.”
“I meant people don’t notice what they should.”
Nadia looked back toward the fitting room. “That is true.”
She returned two minutes later with Elena’s phone, a small leather purse, and Margaret’s evening wrap. She handed the phone to Elena without looking at the screen.
Fourteen notifications waited beneath Adrian’s name.
Elena read the first few and turned the device face down.
“Do you want to turn off location sharing?” Margaret asked.
Elena nodded.
Her hand shook as she opened the settings. She pressed the screen twice, stopped, then handed the phone to her mother.
“Would you?”
Margaret disabled the setting and returned the phone immediately.
May you like
The service elevator opened onto the ground floor beside the kitchen. Staff members moved through swinging doors with trays of glassware and silver chafing dishes. No one stopped the three women. A young man in a white jacket asked Nadia whether the strawberries should be moved to the terrace. She told him to ask Mrs. Bellamy.
Outside, the heat of late afternoon settled over the gravel drive. Margaret’s car waited in a row of vehicles near the garden wall. The Bellamy House façade rose behind them, pale stone and tall windows reflecting a sky too blue for what had happened inside.
