Chương 3
“I did not put anyone outside.”
“You handed them to people who believed that was what you wanted.”
“I did not know Brooke would leave them.”
“And Ron?”
“I told the venue that only listed guests should use the main entrance during the ceremony. That is standard crowd control.”
“They were in the ceremony.”
“They were late.”
Ethan flinched.
Daniel saw it. Claire did too, but she kept speaking.
“The photographer had been waiting. Your daughter’s hair was down, Ethan’s tie was crooked, and nobody could find Nora. My mother’s relatives had flown in from three states. I needed ten minutes.”
“You needed them gone.”
“I needed one part of the day not to turn into a crisis about your children.”
The corridor became still.
Judith whispered, “Claire.”
Claire’s gaze dropped. When she looked up again, fear had cracked through her composure.
“That came out wrong.”
Daniel stared at the woman he had planned to marry. He had loved the way she moved through disorder, how she found missing reservations and corrected invoices and remembered which parent needed a chair near the exit. He had mistaken competence for care so many times that the two had become almost indistinguishable.
“Did it?” he asked.
Peter arrived holding one small dark shoe. He stopped when he saw them.
“I found this beside the service elevator.”
Daniel took it.
Claire’s eyes filled, though the tears did not fall. “Please do not leave like this. Not with everyone watching.”
He looked toward the ballroom doors, where muffled voices rose and fell.
“Everyone was watching when my children came through those doors.”
“That is not what I mean.”
“I know.”
He returned to the bridal suite and slid Lily’s shoe into the pocket of his tuxedo jacket. She had curled against Nora, but she sat up when he entered.
“Are we going home?” Ethan asked.
“Yes.”
“Is Claire coming?”
“No.”
His son looked at the silver ring.
Daniel pulled it from his finger. The skin beneath it was paler than the rest of his hand, though he had worn it for less than five minutes. He placed the band beside Claire’s untouched coffee, where it made a thin metallic sound against the saucer.
They left through the main doors.
No one stopped them.
By the time Daniel reached the house, eleven people had called and thirty-seven had texted. He turned his phone facedown on the kitchen counter. Lily sat at the table in her ivory dress eating dry cereal from a mixing bowl because he could not remember where Claire had put the small bowls after reorganizing the cabinets.
Ethan stood by the refrigerator without taking off his suit jacket.
“You can change,” Daniel said.
“I’m okay.”
“You look uncomfortable.”
“I said I’m okay.”
Daniel opened the freezer and stared at bags of vegetables, frozen waffles, and a bottle of vodka Claire had bought for a dinner party in January. He could not remember why he had opened it.
Nora came in carrying Lily’s overnight bag and kicked the door shut with her heel.
“Peter is dealing with the car,” she said. “The hall says they need an authorized person to release the gifts. Judith is telling people the reception is postponed, which is creative.”
“It’s canceled.”
“I know that. She is apparently giving the shrimp a more complicated answer.”
Daniel closed the freezer.
Nora looked at Ethan, then lowered her voice. “The video is already online.”
“What video?”
“Several. One starts when the doors open. Another has Claire trying to explain in the hall.”
Daniel picked up his phone.
Nora put her hand over it. “Not yet.”
“I need to see what’s out there.”
“No, you want to punish yourself with angles.”
“I need to know whether the children are visible.”
“They are.”
The word landed with its own weight.
Ethan walked toward the stairs.
“Buddy,” Daniel said.
“I’m changing.”
“Leave the suit outside your room. I’ll get it cleaned.”
Ethan stopped with one foot on the first stair.
“I don’t want it.”
Daniel wanted to say it was expensive. The suit had been altered twice because Ethan had grown almost an inch since May. Claire had chosen the brown-gray fabric after rejecting navy because it would blend too closely with Daniel’s tuxedo.
“All right,” he said.
Ethan went upstairs.
Lily lifted another handful of cereal. “Can I wear my dress tomorrow?”
“We’ll see.”
“I didn’t get to throw flowers.”
Daniel sat beside her. “No, you didn’t.”
“Can we have another wedding?”
Nora turned toward the sink.
Daniel wiped a cereal crumb from Lily’s sleeve. “Not tomorrow.”
“I know. Tomorrow is Thursday.”
It was Saturday.
He did not correct that either.
Nora made coffee. She moved around the kitchen as if she still lived there, which she had for the first five months after Daniel’s wife, Rachel, died. She knew which cabinet still stuck in humid weather and where Daniel hid the good chocolate from the children. Claire had disliked that familiarity. She had never said so directly. She had simply moved the mugs, replaced Nora’s chipped yellow cup, and once asked whether his sister really needed a key now that Daniel was “building a new household.”
He had answered that Nora was family.
Claire had smiled and said, “Of course.”
The coffee machine hissed.
“When did you first know she didn’t want them in the pictures?” Nora asked.
Daniel looked at her.
“Don’t.”
“I’m not blaming you.”
“You are.”
“I’m asking because there were forty-seven planning spreadsheets, and Claire did not invent this at three o’clock today.”
Lily swung her feet beneath the chair.
Daniel waited until she wandered into the living room, dragging the mixing bowl with both hands.
“The photography list changed last week,” he said. “Claire said the photographer needed fewer combinations.”
“And?”
“She wanted couple portraits first. Then her side. Then mine.”
“With the kids?”
“I assumed they were on mine.”
“You assumed.”
“Yes.”
May you like
Nora pressed both palms to the counter. “Did you read the list?”
“I was working.”
