Chapter 2 - The Child Nobody Mentioned
Emmett did not move.
For a few seconds the only sound in the library was the faint music filtering through the ballroom wall.
“What child?” he asked.
Claire lifted her chin.
“The one your father-in-law has never bothered to ask about.”
I stared at her.
“I've never heard of another child,” I said.
“Of course you haven't,” Claire replied.
“That would require noticing something that isn't about Phoebe.”
Emmett held up his hand.
“Stop turning this into a fight with Arthur.”
Claire's eyes glittered.
“I've spent two years trying to become part of a family that saves its best chair for a dead woman.”
The sentence landed with a terrible bluntness.
Margot pressed closer to my side.
Emmett glanced at her and immediately changed his expression.
“Arthur, would you take Margot outside for a few minutes?”
I wanted to refuse because I no longer trusted Claire's version of anything.
But this was precisely why my granddaughter should not hear more.
I took her to the small courtyard beyond the library's side door.
A stone fountain murmured beneath strings of wedding lights.
She leaned against my leg without speaking.
“Did I ruin Daddy's wedding?” she asked at last.
I crouched to her level.
“No, peanut.”
“The grown-ups made some mistakes, and grown-ups are responsible for fixing them.”
She picked at the satin ribbon on her dress.
“Claire said everyone would be happier if I stayed quiet.”
I felt anger rise so sharply that I had to press my palm against the cool stone bench.
“Did she say that today?”
Margot nodded.
“And other days.”
That last addition was barely audible.
I chose my next words carefully.
“What other days, sweetheart?”
“She said Daddy gets sad when I talk about Mommy.”
“She said maybe I should keep Mommy stories just for you.”
I thought of all the Sundays Emmett had sat beside me telling stories about Phoebe, never once asking us to stop.
The claim was a lie designed to separate a father from his daughter without either noticing how it happened.
Through the library window I saw Emmett step away from Claire, his posture rigid.
He came outside alone.
His eyes moved from Margot to me.
“Claire says she has a twelve-year-old son,” he said.
“She says he's been living with her sister in Raleigh.”
“Did you know?” I asked.
“No.”
He looked as stunned by his own answer as I was.
“Not once in two years?”
“She told me she couldn't have children, and that she was grateful I already had Margot.”
A breeze rattled the rosebushes.
He opened his phone and showed me a photograph Claire had just sent him.
A dark-haired boy smiled from the steps of a school.
Below the picture was a name: Oliver.
Then a new message appeared from Claire.
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If you embarrass me in front of my family, I'll tell everyone why you really married me.
