Chapter 7: Pool House

After the guests left, Constance said I couldn't sleep under the same roof as the family until the matter was settled.

Christian said it was settled and that she was wrong.

In the end he walked my duffel out to the pool house himself.

It had a door that locked, and it wasn't down a hallway from his mother.

"It's temporary," he said. "Tomorrow I'll sort the rest."

"Thank you."

"Don't thank me. I didn't see it for what it was until tonight."

He looked at the bag in his hand.

Then he went back across the lawn to the house, and I closed the door and sat on the edge of the narrow bed.

An hour passed.

I heard voices through the study window when I came out to the terrace for air.

Giselle's was thin and sharp, and Christian's was low.

"It was a misunderstanding."

"You walked into her room with the necklace."

"I was protecting it."

"On the camera, you were hiding it."

"Christian, listen to me. You're tired. You've been confused since the crash. I'm the one who held you through all of it."

"I know you did."

"We have a daughter."

"I know we do."

"Then what are you doing?"

There was a long silence.

"I can't wear a ring for a woman I feel nothing for," Christian said, and I stopped breathing.

"I've tried for eight months. I'm sorry. I should have said it in March."

"Poppy is ours," Giselle said. It was almost a shriek. "She is ours. You can't take that out of her life!"

"I'm not taking Poppy out of anything."

"Everything I did, I did for this family."

A door slammed hard enough to shake the glass.

I backed into the pool house and shut my own door and sat in the dark with my heart pounding.

I did not hear him cross the lawn.

I only heard the knock, three soft raps, and then his voice.

"Ellie. It's me."

I opened the door.

He stood on the threshold in his shirtsleeves with his collar open and his hair a mess.

The porch light turned the planes of his face gold.

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