The Phoenix's Rebirth for Revenge novel · Chapter 10 of 32

Chapter 10: The Centennial

Gran took the phone out of my hand and stopped the recording herself.

"The centennial," she said. "Saturday. In the boat shed."

"You're not going."

"Sweetheart, it's my company's hundredth birthday. My father-in-law built the first hull in that shed with his own two hands." She tucked the phone back into her cardigan. "I'm going if I have to be carried in on a stretcher."

"That might be what she's planning."

"Then we'd better plan first."

On Saturday night the main shed of Haverhill Marine was strung with ten thousand white lights.

The old wooden launch rails had been scrubbed and polished.

A half-built mahogany hull sat on a cradle at one end, with a jazz band playing in front of it.

Three hundred people in black tie were drinking champagne on the slipway where my great-grandfather had launched his first boat.

Ambrose had his hand on the small of my back.

"Every Haverhill shareholder, every banker in Boston and half the yacht club," he said in my ear. "If I were going to ruin somebody, I'd do it here."

Gran sat at the head table in navy silk with her cane hooked over her chair.

She was drinking only water.

Ambrose had poured it himself from a sealed bottle, and he'd put the bottle in his inside pocket.

My parents were working the room.

My mother in grey chiffon, my father in a tuxedo he'd been wearing to galas since I was ten.

Sabine was everywhere at once, in silver sequins, hugging people.

She hugged me twice.

The second time, at the bar, she held on longer than she needed to.

"I'm sorry about Monday," she said into my hair, loud enough for the bartender. "I want us to be sisters again."

Then she let go, smiled and drifted away into the crowd.

I stood very still.

My clutch was under my arm, a little gold one with a magnetic clasp.

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