Chapter 8
My father didn't look at Jonah when he spoke next. He looked down.
The guests had gone quiet in that way people do when they don't want to be called on. Jonah stood two steps above me on the curved staircase, one hand still resting on the ornate railing like he owned the air around it. I hadn't moved from where he'd left me, bare feet cold against the polished marble, the hem of my light blue dress twisted around my ankle. My arms were still crossed tight over my chest because I didn't know where else to put them where the bruises wouldn't show.
My father crouched. Not all the way down, just enough that his knees cracked. He pointed with two fingers, not touching anything.
"Elise," he said. His voice was low and even. "What is that."
I followed his hand. The floor caught the chandelier light and threw it back. Scattered across the marble at the bottom of the stairs were pieces of glass, small and sharp and glittering. I'd been kneeling in them ten minutes earlier without even feeling it. One shard near my big toe had a smear of red on its edge.
"It's glass," I said.
"What from," he said.
Jonah made a small sound behind us, a breath through his nose. "It's nothing. A glass got knocked over during setup. I've had staff trying to clean it all night."
My father didn't answer him. He kept his eyes on me. "Elise. What from."
My throat was so dry it hurt. I could hear the chandelier humming faintly above us, the soft shift of dresses as the women along the wall leaned in.
"It wasn't a glass," I said. My voice came out smaller than I wanted it to. I swallowed. "It was the vase. The heavy one from the entry table."
Jonah's hand tightened on the railing. "Elise, don't."
"He threw it," I said. I didn't look at Jonah. I looked at the glass on the floor because it was easier. "Before anyone got here. We were arguing in the foyer and I said I didn't want to do the welcome speech and he picked it up and threw it past my head. It hit the wall by the stairs and shattered."
The silence that followed was different. Before, people had been watching a scene. Now they were listening to a statement.
My father finally looked up at Jonah. "You threw a vase at your wife."
"It didn't hit her," Jonah said quickly. Too quickly. He lifted both hands, palms out, that composed smile sliding back into place. "We were both heated. It was stupid. It slipped. I told her I was sorry. Ask her, I apologized right after."
"You didn't apologize," I said. "You told me to clean it up before the caterers saw."
From the far side of the ballroom, near the service door, a man in a black vest stepped forward half a step and then stopped, like he wasn't sure he was allowed to speak. He was maybe fifty, short hair, a headset hanging around his neck. The catering manager.
My father turned his head toward him. "Did you hear something earlier."
The manager glanced at Jonah, then at me, then down at his hands. His jaw worked.
"Sir," he said to my father, not to Jonah. "We heard a crash around eight. Eight-oh-five. My staff was setting the bar by the staircase. Loud bang, glass breaking. We came out and Mr.—" He hesitated. "—he told us not to worry about it, that he'd handle it. He told us to stay in the kitchen until the guests arrived."
"What time did guests arrive," my father asked.
"Eight-thirty," the manager said. "First car at eight twenty-eight."
Jonah laughed, a short sharp sound. "See? This is ridiculous. We had a fight, the vase broke, my staff heard it. That doesn't prove anything. Couples fight."
My father stood up slowly. He didn't raise his voice. "It proves you broke something in anger an hour before you put your hands on her in front of forty people. It proves the debris didn't come from a tipped water glass during setup. It proves there was violence before the party started."
He pointed again at the floor, at the largest piece, a curved base of thick glass lying near the bottom step.
"And it proves you left it there," he said. "You left your wife to kneel in it."
I felt my eyes fill before I could stop them. Not from Jonah's words this time, but from the floor itself, from seeing it through my father's eyes. The scattered reflective debris wasn't just mess anymore. It had a time on it. Eight-oh-five. Before the chandelier was dimmed, before the guests lined the walls, before Jonah gripped my arm and I went to my knees.
Jonah looked down at the glass like he was seeing it for the first time too. His smug expression had slipped. He stepped down one step, his shoe stopping just short of the shards.
"We've all heard enough," he said, trying to regain the room. "Let's get this cleaned up. Elise, honey, let's get you off that floor."
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I didn't move. My father didn't move either. He stayed between me and the stairs, his shoulder angled just enough that Jonah would have to go through him to reach me.
"Leave it," my father said to the manager, and to Jonah, and to everyone. "Nobody touches the floor."
