His Secret Wife Walked Away Pregnant novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: The Door

In a borrowed gown she reaches the Hargrove gala, gets past Bennett at the door, and watches Gavin kneel to Veronica.

The doctor signed me out at six, and she did not like it.

"If the bleeding comes back, you come back," she said. "Sit down as much as you can."

Teagan had found a green silk gown in her sister's closet and brought it in a garment bag.

It was one size too big at the waist, which turned out to be lucky.

She pinned the back, tied my hair up, and stuck a bandage over the hole the IV had left in my arm.

"You look like a woman who owns the building," she said.

"I look like a woman who needs to sit."

"That too."

On Fifth Avenue the Hargrove house took up half a block, every window lit, and a line of black cars waited at the curb.

A man in a dark suit stood by the front steps, checking a tablet.

I got out of Teagan's car and put my hand on the door until the street stopped tilting.

"I'll be right here," Teagan said. "Wave and I'll come in swinging."

I climbed the steps one at a time.

The man with the tablet looked up, and he was taller than I'd expected and not at all the doorman type.

He had broad shoulders, short brown hair and a face that gave nothing away.

"Name?" he said.

"Joanna."

He scrolled, and then scrolled back.

"You're not on the list."

"I know."

"Then I can't let you in, Miss..."

"Hargrove," I said. "Joanna Hargrove."

His eyes came up to mine.

"The only Hargroves tonight are my family. And my cousin has no wife."

"Your cousin has one," I said. "She's standing on your steps."

I got my phone out of the clutch and switched it on.

Forty-one messages from Gavin came in at once, and I swiped them away without reading.

I opened a photo I'd taken three years ago, the day we signed.

The county clerk's stamp, both our names, a date in March.

He read the whole thing and then looked at my left hand.

At the plain silver band.

"Gavin told you that you couldn't come," he said. It wasn't a question.

"He told me security would drag me out."

"Security works for me." He tucked the tablet under his arm. "I'm Bennett. Gavin's cousin."

He glanced at the plastic bracelet still on my wrist, half hidden by the silk, and his jaw moved.

"You were in the hospital today."

"I was."

"Is it serious?"

I could have lied.

"I'm eight weeks pregnant," I said. "I almost lost the baby this afternoon, while he was at the Plaza with her."

Bennett said nothing for a moment.

Then he took a folded handkerchief from his pocket, wiped the last of my mascara from under my eye, and put the cloth back.

"There's a chair by the wall in the ballroom," he said. "Near the stage. Take it, and stay in it until you need to stand."

"You believe me."

"I believe the certificate."

He opened the heavy door.

"And I believe my cousin lies for fun."

I walked into the Hargrove ballroom.

It was exactly as it had looked in the photos, with gold chandeliers, a twelve-foot tree and a tower of champagne glasses stacked taller than a man.

Three hundred people in black tie stood in clusters, laughing, holding flutes.

Nobody looked at me.

An orchestra played something light.

On a raised platform at the far end, a white-haired woman in dark blue sat very straight in a high-backed chair, with a cane across her knees.

That was Gavin's grandmother, Beatrice, and she was looking straight at the door.

Straight at me.

My stomach dropped.

She had the face he'd described, thin and sharp and unamused.

I slid into the chair by the wall.

Bennett stood behind it with one hand on the back.

"Whatever you do, do it in front of her," he said quietly, and went to the side of the room.

I didn't understand that.

The orchestra stopped.

A single light came on over the stage, and Gavin walked into it.

He wore a black tuxedo and the slow, crooked smile.

"Good evening, everyone."

His voice carried to every corner of the room.

"Thank you for coming to celebrate my grandmother's eightieth birthday."

Applause rolled through the ballroom.

"Before the champagne," he said, "there's one more thing I've waited a very long time to do."

He held out a hand toward the crowd.

A woman in a silver gown came up the steps, and the room parted for her.

Blonde hair swept high, a fur wrap on her bare shoulders, a crystal heel on each foot.

The woman from the car.

She took his hand and smiled only at him.

Gavin went down on one knee.

I heard the whole room breathe in.

He took the little velvet box out of his pocket, the same box I had held in a dark garage, and opened it.

"Veronica," he said. "I have loved you for three years."

My hand closed on the arm of the chair until my knuckles ached.

"Will you marry me?"

She laughed and put her hand over her mouth.

"Yes," she said. "Yes, in front of everyone, yes."

The room roared.

Phones came up, and camera flashes filled the dark.

Gavin slid the ring onto her finger.

I stood up.

The baby shifted in me, or I imagined it did.

I walked down the aisle between the clusters of guests, in a borrowed green gown and a hospital bracelet, and I said his name.

"Gavin."

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