He Made Me Sign, Not Knowing I Was Another's Wife novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: The Diamond

"Viv," Clay said. "Listen to me. Hugh did all of that. I only went along."

"You went along," Vivienne said.

"I didn't write any of it."

"You wrote Leave it."

He looked at her blankly.

"Under my message about the ring," she said. "Hers. A woman wears a plain ring on the courthouse steps, a hundred people laugh, and you write Leave it. You never asked if it was real."

"I didn't think."

"No. You didn't."

She turned her head and looked across the dance floor at me.

Two hundred people were pretending not to watch.

I stayed where I was, between Ansel and my aunt.

Vivienne crossed the floor alone, the cream silk moving around her, and stopped three feet from me.

Clay started to follow.

"Don't you dare come after me," she said, without turning, and he stopped.

"Leona."

"Vivienne."

"At the café I said I never wanted to hurt you." Her voice was low and even. "That was true. I didn't want to. I also never asked what was happening to you. I told myself that was kindness."

"It was easier," I said.

"Yes."

She took a breath.

"I'm going to ask you something, and I'd like the truth. When Hugh said I don't ask, was it a joke? Is that what you all thought of me?"

"I don't know what Clay thought," I said. "I know what I thought. I thought you were the nicest person at a table where nobody else was."

Her mouth trembled and was still.

"That's worse," she said.

"I know."

"I set a trap with a third cup of coffee."

"You did."

"Hugh said it was a family kindness. He said you'd be hurt and then helped." She shook her head slowly. "I wanted so much to believe it that I didn't hear how it sounded."

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