Chapter 18: To Family

Harlan's lawyer withdrew the petition on Monday morning, an hour before the hearing.

By then the officers' report was in the news, and so was the pharmacist's result.

Harlan said nothing publicly, and I took that as a bad sign.

He did not cancel his party.

On Saturday night, at five minutes to seven, I stood in the Alder Grand's service elevator in a twelve-pound ivory gown with my mother on my arm.

Ellen wore a plain navy dress and red lipstick.

She had borrowed a cane she did not need, and she carried it for show.

"Are you ready?" I asked.

"No," my mother said. "Open the door."

The elevator opened on the ballroom.

It was the same room.

The same chandeliers, the same long windows, the same four giant screens on the walls.

Four hundred guests in dark suits and cocktail dresses stood with champagne, under a banner that read THIRTY YEARS OF STROUD HOMES.

The band was playing something light.

They had set the long head table across the stage, with a white cloth and a tower of roses.

Harlan stood at the center of it in a charcoal tuxedo, shaking a board member's hand.

Blair sat on his right in a champagne dress, with her hair up and a smile pinned to her face.

On his left, an empty chair waited with a place card in his handwriting.

Ellen Stroud.

I walked down the center aisle with my mother.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Four Hundred Guests Watched Him Cheat, So I Took Everything He Had from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.