He Chose Her, So I Faked My Death novel · Chapter 16 of 32
Chapter 16: No Baby, No Tears
On Saturday night Lydia Harcourt stood on a stage in a white gown and told four hundred donors she had lost her baby.
I watched from the back of the ballroom with Jasper's hand around mine.
The Harcourt Foundation gala raised money every year for the families of mine workers.
The irony would have made me laugh, if I had not been so angry.
Lydia held the microphone in both hands.
Her eyes were red, and her voice shook, and a plastic band circled her thin wrist.
"Four days ago I was carrying a child," she said. "Then a woman I thought was dead walked into my home and screamed at me. I collapsed. I woke up in a hospital bed."
She held up the band so the cameras could see it.
"I lost him," she said, and wept.
The ballroom murmured with pity.
A woman near me whispered, "That poor girl."
Up on the dais her father stood stiff in a black tuxedo, and he did not touch her, and he did not look at her.
"It's the stress," a man behind me said. "That wife is a menace."
I felt Jasper's hand tighten on mine.
"Now?" he said into my ear.
"Wait for the end of the speech."
Lydia dabbed her cheek with a tissue.
"I only want my privacy and a chance to grieve," she said. "I forgive Imogen. I truly do. I hope she gets the help she needs."
Applause began to ripple through the tables.
I walked down the center aisle.
The applause died in a wave.
People turned in their chairs, and a fork rang on a plate, and then every head in the room was on me.
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