A Love Lost to the Years novel · Chapter 8 of 24
Chapter 8: The Telling
Annabel had rehearsed this for seven years, and now that it was happening, none of the sentences were useful.
Kenneth stood in the study doorway with his trousers on and his shirt still open.
He was looking at the photograph in her lap.
She had known he would recognize it.
She had not known he would do it in the first second.
"Sit down," she said.
"I'd rather stand."
"Then stand. I'm going to say it in order. Please don't stop me until the end."
He folded his arms.
He didn't say yes, and he didn't leave.
"That's my father's mill," Annabel said. "Wexford Millwork. He built it. He ran it until nine years ago, when Sheldon sold it out from under him."
Kenneth's face did not move.
"Sheldon was his junior partner and my fiancé.
"He signed a purchase agreement with a developer behind my father's back, and he kept the fee.
"My father found out from a letter. He had his stroke on the floor of the shop that same week.
"He lived another three weeks."
"Annabel."
"Please."
He closed his mouth.
"The developer hired an architecture firm to turn the site into condominiums. When the closing papers came to the house, the plans were in the envelope."
She turned the frame so he could see the east wall.
"The demolition set had a drafting stamp in the corner of every sheet. A man's initials and a date. E.P."
Kenneth looked at the ceiling.
For a second she thought he might laugh.
He didn't.
"I looked you up. It took one afternoon.
"You had just left that firm, and you had opened a shop with a loan against a truck."
She swallowed. "I hated you for a year, Ken. I hated you more clearly than I've hated anyone."
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