Queen Mom Rules novel · Chapter 6 of 24

Chapter 6: The Will

My mother did not wait for anyone to answer.

"This is what you've done to us," she said, pointing at me across the broken glass. "You've turned your sister white as a sheet."

Then she grabbed her purse and her glass necklace and swept out of the dining room.

My uncle stood up and followed her, saying her name.

My father stayed where he was.

He looked at the champagne on the tile and the sparkling pieces of the flute.

Then he looked at Cassidy, who stood with both hands over her mouth.

"Cassie," he said. "What does she mean, everything?"

"Daddy, I..."

"Cassie."

"I have to go," my sister said.

She grabbed her car keys from the island and ran out of her own house in her bare feet.

I took Junie home.

The afternoon passed in pancakes, laundry and a long bath, and I did not cry once.

At eleven that night the doorbell rang.

It rang again, softly.

I opened the door in my robe.

Cassidy was on the porch in sweatpants and a coat, with her mascara all down her face and a thick manila envelope in both hands.

"Please don't shut it," she said.

"I wasn't going to."

I stepped back, and she walked into my living room and stood there.

She looked at the rug, and the drawings on the walls, and the crooked bookcase I'd built myself the year I started the company.

"This is nice," she said, and burst into tears.

I let her cry for a minute.

Then I sat her on the couch, made her a cup of tea, and waited until her hands stopped shaking.

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