Not spectacle.
Boundaries.
“No,” I said.
“I’m refusing to keep pretending you didn’t already break it.”
Matthew’s face hardened.
“You have no idea what this will do to you financially.”
My attorney had warned me he might try that.
Threats often arrive when charm stops working.
I tapped the accounting folder.
“That’s why I hired someone who does.”
Rachel smiled for the first time that afternoon.
Matthew looked at the folder, and whatever response he’d prepared disappeared.
One of his investors approached slowly.
He didn’t ask about the affair.
He looked at Matthew and said, “We should speak Monday.”
Nothing more.
He didn’t need to say more.
Matthew’s jaw clenched.
The man left with his wife shortly afterward.
Other guests began saying quiet goodbyes.
Some hugged me.
Some simply touched my arm.
A few looked ashamed that they’d laughed through Matthew’s speech without noticing what was happening three feet away.
I didn’t blame them.
Matthew had fooled people for a living.
He had fooled me once too.
Vanessa stood alone near the edge of the patio.
Her perfect posture was gone.
Finally, she walked toward the table and looked down at the photograph of herself kissing Matthew.
“Did you know about me the whole time?” she asked.
“Three months.”
She looked at Matthew.
“You told me she suspected nothing.”
I almost pitied her.
Almost.
Matthew snapped, “Vanessa, leave.”
She stared at him.
“That’s it?”
“Leave.”
Her face changed then.
The confidence she’d brought into my garden vanished completely.
She picked up her bag and walked toward the gate without another word.
Matthew didn’t follow her.
He was too busy watching his own life rearrange itself around him.
His mother approached him next.
“You brought that woman here?”
“Mom—”
“To Olivia’s baby shower?”
He looked exhausted now.
“It was complicated.”
She shook her head.
“No.
You made it complicated.”
Then she walked past him and came to me.
Her eyes were red.
“I’m sorry,” eyes were red.
