Chapter 5: Dinner for Three

Grady's text had come while I was lying on the exam table.

Dinner at 7. Wear something nice. Let's be adults about this.

I read it again on the sidewalk outside Tom's shop.

It didn't say happy anniversary. It didn't say sorry.

At five to seven I stood in the lobby with Tom in a clean blue shirt beside me.

The gate light was red.

Keaton came out of the elevator in jeans and held his phone to the reader.

"Two guests," he told the attendant. "Both mine."

The attendant looked at Tom, then at me.

He pressed the screen.

The light turned green.

"I'll be next door," Keaton said quietly to me. "Knock on the wall if you need a witness."

"The wall's across a hallway."

"Then knock loud."

On the eighteenth floor I stood outside 1806 and rang my own bell.

Grady opened it with a wine glass in his hand.

He saw Tom behind me.

His face went flat.

"What is he doing here?"

"You said dinner at seven," I said. "I brought a guest."

Past his shoulder I could see our dining table.

It was set for three.

There were white candles in the silver holders my mother gave us as a wedding present.

Summer stood at the stove in an apron. Her head came up. She saw Tom.

The spoon dropped out of her hand.

"Hello, Summer," Tom said.

She went pale.

Then she put her hand on her stomach.

"Tom. I told you not to come."

"You told me you needed space. You didn't tell me the space was in my friend's wife's kitchen."

"Don't talk to her like that," Grady said.

"Is it mine?" Tom said to Summer.

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