Chapter 10: After The Guests Were Sent Home
By the time I left the ballroom, the flowers had begun to look like evidence.
They stood in tall glass cylinders along the aisle, white and undisturbed beneath the chandeliers, while the guests moved around them in small, embarrassed groups. No one asked me directly what had happened. They watched my face, then looked away. The ceremony had not taken place, the marriage license had not been filed, and the room had become a place where everyone was waiting for someone else to explain the silence.
I did not give them an explanation.
Teresa brought Leo through the side entrance wrapped in a light blanket. His cheek rested against her shoulder, his breathing slow and even. She wore the same dark cardigan she had worn when she first warned me, and her expression held no satisfaction, only concern. I took my son from her carefully, keeping the gold ring closed in my palm.
At the estate, the front doors opened before we reached them. The staff had been told to expect us, but no one had been told what to say. Teresa went straight toward the nursery. I followed with Leo, carrying him past the framed wedding photographs and the arrangements Victoria had chosen for the entrance hall.
One of those photographs showed us smiling beneath an arch of greenery. I stopped in front of it.
The image had been printed for display that morning. Victoria’s hand rested against my chest, and the ring on her finger caught the light. I removed the frame from the table and placed it face down in the office, not in the trash. The invitations went into a document box. So did the seating chart, the vendor agreements, and the folder containing the canceled schedule. I left the flowers where they were.
Destroying the image would have been easy. Preserving it was harder, but I no longer trusted myself to decide which object was meaningless and which might matter later.
David arrived before Leo was fully settled. He entered the office with a leather case and a tablet, his attention already divided between the household and the company. He did not ask whether I was certain. He opened a new inventory and began listing what Victoria had been able to reach: estate correspondence, personal files, company calendars, financial summaries, and the commitments associated with the wedding.
I stood beside the desk while he worked.
The list grew longer than I expected. Victoria had not been an employee of Sterling Developments, but proximity had given her access. She had attended meetings, reviewed schedules, and received information because I believed I was bringing her into my life permanently. Now every courtesy had to be examined without turning suspicion into accusation.
Teresa returned from the nursery and paused at the office door. I looked toward the hall, where Leo had begun to stir. She understood before I spoke and went back to him.
Victoria called while David was checking the filing status. Her name appeared on my phone, bright against the dark screen.
I answered but said nothing.
For several seconds, there was only breathing. Then her voice came through, controlled and close, as if she were standing beside me.
“Don't go downstairs yet. You need to hear this.”
The words belonged to the morning, to the moment before everything had broken open. Hearing them now made the office seem smaller. I ended the call without responding.
A minute later, a message arrived. She wanted to come to the estate. I placed the phone beside David’s tablet and turned it facedown.
David looked at the screen, then at me. He tapped once and stopped.
A new company notice had appeared in the calendar. Sterling Developments was scheduled to make a decision the following morning on a pending commitment tied to information Victoria had recently handled. The notice required review before anyone acted.
The wedding was over, but the access it had created was not.
May you like
I picked up the ring and held it between my fingers while David opened the record. Upstairs, Leo began to cry softly, and Teresa moved toward him before the sound could grow.
I followed her, leaving David to secure the office and the first page of the inventory open behind me.
