Chapter 19: Preston's Voice

The first thing out of the speakers was ice clinking in a glass.

Then a man's voice, thick and low, filled the ballroom.

"I was driving."

Three hundred and fifty heads turned toward the white wall.

"I'd been drinking since noon. Dad kept saying, 'Take Elijah, he'll watch you.' I told him I was fine."

The photograph had gone. In its place a gray line shivered across the screen in time with the voice.

"I took the Shore Road bridge too fast. I hit the rail. The car rolled."

Eldon's glass was still raised.

He looked at the wall, and then at the sound booth at the back of the room.

"Cut that," he said, not loud. "Cut it now."

The man in the black vest at the back did not move.

"Eli got you out," said the voice on the speakers.

"I stood there and watched my brother carry you up the bank, and I didn't help."

A woman near the front pressed her hand to her mouth.

"He took one look and said, 'Preston carried the girl. Elijah was never here.'"

Eldon put his glass down.

At the altar, Preston stood with his bride's hand in his and his eyes closed.

He didn't try to stop it.

"I let you thank me for six years," his voice said.

"I told myself it wasn't a lie because you were happy. I told myself it was kind."

The recording clicked off.

For a moment there was no sound in the Ward Regency at all.

Then a man in the fourth row said, loud and clear, "Did Preston Ward just say his father covered up a drunk driving crash?"

The room broke open.

People stood. Phones came up. Somebody laughed in shock and somebody else said, "That's the baker, that's the girl."

Zara's father stood up at the front, a heavy man in a navy suit.

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