Chapter 19: Two Hundred and Forty, Paid in Full

Ezra's POV

She kept her word for five days.

She ate breakfast across from me and rode in my car, and she stood at my elbow at every dinner Gerald's friends threw for the wedding.

She never once arrived late, and she never once touched me.

She slept in the third room down the hall with the door shut.

I lay awake and listened for it to open.

By Friday I knew every sound that house made at night, and none of them was her.

The rehearsal dinner was in the Maddox dining room, the same room where she had read page nine.

Gerald had set it for forty.

He sat halfway down the table, no longer at the head, because I sat there, and he had not looked at me since the board.

Colby sat on his father's right with a clean bandage and a loose, careless grin.

Daphne was beside him in the seat on the invitation, in a pale pink dress.

She had curled her hair for it.

Martin sat at the far end with a glass of water and his hands in his lap.

Sadie came in last.

She wore the plain ivory sheath, buttoned to the throat.

She walked down the length of the room to my side, and every head turned to follow her, and she did not look at any of them.

I stood and pulled out her chair.

"Thank you," she said, in the voice she used for waiters.

I sat.

I would have given every share I owned to hear her say my name.

Gerald raised his glass.

"To the happy couple," he said. "Whoever they may be."

Nobody drank.

Colby laughed into his wine.

The soup came, and it was cold, and no one noticed.

I watched Sadie's oldest friend put her hand on my nephew's sleeve and leave it there.

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