Claimed After Divorce by My Brother's Best Friend novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: The Toast
Della toasts her husband at his company's launch banquet, and the woman who left his twins six years ago walks in. Gilbert's father gives away Della's seat in front of the whole pack, and Della walks out. Outside, her brother's best friend says Gilbert knew.
The woman in the pale blue dress walked into Gilbert's launch party just as I finished my toast.
Two hundred people had clapped for me a minute earlier.
Now nobody was clapping, and I didn't know why.
I had stood on the little stage with a champagne glass and said what I'd practiced in the car.
I said the new supplement was going to help a lot of families.
I said my husband had worked for it for years.
Gilbert had kissed my cheek and told me I always knew what to say.
That morning he had handed me my tea in the blue mug, the way he did every morning, and said tonight was only the toast.
"Nothing else, Della. Relax and enjoy it."
So I was enjoying it.
My twins were at a small table by the dessert bar, coloring with a nanny.
My daughter waved at me with a purple crayon.
My son grinned, and the gap where his front tooth had been showed.
They were six, and I had been their mother since the week they came home from the hospital.
I turned to get a drink, and the room had changed.
Voices dropped.
A man laughed and stopped halfway through it.
The woman stood just inside the doors with her hands knotted together.
Her eyes were swollen from crying.
Her dress was pale blue, and she wore no jewelry with it.
I had never seen her before in my life.
But my wolf lifted her head inside me, and I had not let her out in six years.
Beside me, Gilbert stopped moving.
He wasn't startled, and he wasn't confused.
"Gilbert?" I said.
He didn't look at me.
The woman took one step forward.
"I know it's your night," she said. "I'll be gone in a minute."
"Imogen," Gilbert said.
He knew her.
The whole room knew her, I realized.
Half the faces were turned to her, and the other half were turned to me, watching to see what I would do.
I was the only person in that hall who had to be told who she was.
"I owe you an apology for leaving the way I did," Imogen said. "It took me six years to find the nerve."
Her eyes slid to me.
"And I owe one to Gilbert's wife," she added.
Before she spoke the last part, she glanced at the head table.
I noticed it only because it was strange.
She hadn't looked at Gilbert for permission.
She had looked at his father.
The old man was already standing, and he tapped a spoon on his glass the way people do at weddings.
Nobody had asked him to speak.
"Friends," Gilbert's father said. "Pack. This is a night for good news, and I have more of it."
He held out a hand toward Imogen.
"The mother of my grandchildren has come home. The bond that the moon chose for my son has found its way back to him."
People started to clap, slowly, and then more.
"The Luna's seat has waited for her," he said.
His eyes moved over me without stopping.
"And we thank Della for six years of looking after the children. We could not have asked for a better nanny."
Nanny.
I looked at Gilbert.
My husband looked at the floor, and then he took my elbow and spoke into my ear.
"Don't make a scene, Della. We'll talk about it at home."
He had said tonight was only the toast.
I felt something in my chest go quiet and hard.
Across the room a nanny was already lifting my son, Milo, out of his chair.
My daughter, Polly, was already being carried off, and she twisted to look for me over the nanny's shoulder.
I understood then that nobody had planned for me to be asked.
I took off my ring.
It was a thin gold band, and I had worn it for six years.
I set it in the bottom of Gilbert's champagne glass and it made a small clink.
"I want a divorce," I said.
I said it loudly enough that the people in front could hear, and they passed it back.
"Della," Gilbert said. "Be reasonable."
"I was," I said. "For six years."
So I stepped out.
The doors were heavy.
Outside, the night air was cold on my arms, and I realized my hands were shaking.
At the far end of the drive a man stood by a dark truck with his arms folded.
Dalton Reeve, my brother's best friend, was the only guest who had not clapped for my toast.
My head always ached when he was near.
It was aching now.
"You're leaving," he said.
"Yes."
"Good." He pushed off the truck and opened the passenger door. "Get in. I'll take you to your brother's."
"Did you know she was coming?"
"His father's driver brought her to the kitchen door at four this afternoon," Dalton said. "Gilbert came out and let her in."
I stared at him.
"He told me this morning it was only a toast," I said.
"I know," Dalton said. "I watched him walk her through the kitchen, and then I watched him smile at you."
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