He Let Her Rip Our License, So I Married Another Man novel · Chapter 16 of 24

Chapter 16: The Club

The club dining room went quiet when Eleanor came through the doors on her cane with me on her arm.

Forty women in pastel jackets turned to look.

Claudia sat at the center table with four of them, her back straight, the lawyer's envelope beside her bread plate.

She had saved me a chair.

"Hallie, dear," she said. "How brave of you."

"I brought a guest," I said. "You'll remember Eleanor."

Claudia's smile held, but I watched her hand close on her napkin.

"Eleanor. I didn't know you'd be joining us."

"I run this club's lunch committee," Eleanor said. "I've sat at every table in this room. Sit down, Hallie."

I sat across from Claudia.

Eleanor took the chair at the head of the table without being invited, and the woman who had been in it moved without a word.

Claudia lifted the envelope.

"I'll be plain. My son's family has been wronged. The engagement ring is a Whitford heirloom. The wedding deposits came out of Cade's pocket, and I mean to have both back."

"I see," I said.

"I'd prefer to do this privately. But since you brought an audience."

"Please don't stop on my account."

She opened the letter and read it aloud, in the voice she used for charity auctions.

Sixty-three thousand dollars.

One ring.

A line about a gold digger who had used an old man's promise to trap the Chatsworth heir.

The women around her nodded, one after another.

I reached into my bag and took out a folded napkin.

I laid it on the cloth in front of Claudia and opened it.

The ring sat in the middle, a thin old band with a small yellow stone.

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