I Was Never One of Them novel · Chapter 4 of 24

Chapter 4: Wedding Gift

At dawn the road crew cut the pine, and Rhys drove me back up to the lodge without being asked.

I did not thank him.

I wore my own wet clothes under his coat and held my mother's veil in its box on my knees.

"Wait here," I said, when we stopped in front of the porch.

"I'll carry the bag."

"I said wait."

He waited.

Inside, the whole circle sat at the long breakfast table in cashmere and bathrobes.

Eggs, coffee, a bowl of strawberries someone had flown in.

Gavin sat at one end beside Whitney, who wore a new phone and a gold chain under her sweater.

At the other end, in a cream coat she hadn't taken off, sat Constance Lockridge.

She had arrived before the plows.

She was smaller than her voice, silver-haired, pearls at her throat, and she smiled at me.

"Hazel, dear. Sit. You look exhausted."

"I came for my suitcase."

"Of course. After you've eaten."

"I'm not eating with you."

The husbands looked at their plates.

One of the wives lifted her phone, and Constance gave her a small shake of the head, and the phone went down.

That told me everything about who ran this table.

"Constance." I held on to the back of an empty chair. "Last night you said the foundation has never missed a payment. I'd like you to say it again where everyone can hear."

Gavin set down his fork. "Haz, not here."

"Here is where you all live."

Constance folded her napkin into a neat square.

"Your mother is on dialysis three days a week," she said. "Eight years ago, after your brother's accident, the Lockridge Family Foundation set up a fund for her care. Every bill. Every transport. The new fistula in March."

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