Too Late. I'm Married to the Godfather novel · Chapter 1 of 24
Chapter 1: Five Years Later
Mistaken for a beggar and accused of theft in a Fifth Avenue lobby by the ex who once proposed to her with a soda-can tab, Carly refuses to leave, until the elevator opens on her husband.
Five years ago, Grayson Tate got down on one knee in front of forty people and held out the pull tab from a soda can.
"This is about what you're worth to me," he said.
Then he stood up and put a real diamond on Whitney Lyle's finger.
Everybody on that rooftop laughed.
I kept the tab.
It lives in the coin pocket of my wallet, and I call it my receipt.
On Friday night I walked into the Hotel Marchese on Fifth Avenue with that wallet in my parka and fourteen hours of ER in my bones.
My scrubs had a coffee stain down the front.
My parka had a rip in the sleeve where a drunk had grabbed me at four in the morning.
I was carrying a plastic grocery bag with a cake topper in it, a green dinosaur holding a candle.
My son turned four the next day.
I crossed the marble under the big brass chandelier, headed for the elevators.
"Carly?"
I knew the voice before I turned around.
Grayson stood by the front desk in a gray suit that cost more than my first car.
He still had the dimple. He still checked his watch while he talked.
Whitney was beside him in a white coat, her phone up, filming.
She was blonder now. Her teeth were whiter.
Grayson looked at my scrubs. Then my parka. Then the plastic bag.
His face did something soft and terrible.
"Oh, Carly," he said. "Oh, no."
"Hi, Grayson."
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his money clip.
He peeled off a twenty and folded it into my hand before I understood what he was doing.
"Get yourself something to eat," he said quietly. "Somewhere warm. You can't sleep in here, they'll call someone."
Whitney laughed behind her phone.
"Babe, that's so sweet. Say hi, everyone. This is the girl he almost married."
I looked down at the twenty in my palm.
"I'm not homeless," I said.
"It's okay." Grayson patted my arm. "You don't have to explain."
"I'm a doctor."
Whitney laughed harder. "And I'm a astronaut."
"An," I said.
She stopped laughing.
Then she grabbed her own wrist and gasped.
"My bracelet."
Grayson turned. "What?"
"My bracelet is gone. It was right here." She swung the phone toward me. "She brushed right past me. She touched my arm."
"I didn't touch you."
"Security!" Whitney's voice went up an octave. "This woman stole my bracelet!"
Two guards in black suits crossed the lobby fast.
The guests at the front desk turned to watch. A man with a luggage cart stopped dead.
"Ma'am, I need you to come with us," the bigger guard said.
"I didn't take anything."
"Then you won't mind." He took the plastic bag out of my hand.
The other guard took my arm.
"Don't," I said.
He didn't listen.
The first one pulled my bag off my shoulder, unzipped it and turned it upside down over the marble.
Everything I owned that day hit the floor.
My stethoscope. A granola bar. Three pens from three different drug reps. A tube of diaper cream I'd forgotten was in there.
My wallet bounced and fell open.
The tab slid out of the coin pocket and spun on the marble, ringing.
It stopped right at Grayson's polished shoe.
He stared at it.
Whitney leaned over and zoomed in.
"Oh my God." She was almost crying with laughter now. "Gray. Gray, look. She kept it."
Grayson picked it up between two fingers.
For a second he looked almost touched.
"You kept this," he said. "For five years."
"Give it back."
"Carly." He shook his head slowly. "Look at you. This is what happens. I'm sorry, but this is what happens when you can't let go."
A woman near the revolving door said, "That's so sad."
The guard was still holding my arm.
The old me would have picked up her pens and her granola bar and walked out with her face on fire.
I had done that once, from a rooftop, in a green dress.
I wasn't doing it again.
"Let go of my arm," I said to the guard.
"Ma'am, you need to come to the security office."
"No. I'm staying right here, where everyone can see." I pointed up at the black glass dome on the ceiling. "Pull that camera. The one over the desk too. And before anybody touches my bag again, search her coat."
Whitney's mouth fell open. "Excuse me?"
"You heard me. Left pocket."
"You're not searching me, you lunatic. Do you know who my father is?"
"No," I said. "Do you know who owns this hotel?"
The guard's grip loosened a little.
Grayson sighed.
"Just call the police," he told the guards. "She's clearly not well."
"Call them," I said. "Please. I'll wait."
Behind me, the elevator chimed.
The doors slid open.
The whole lobby went quiet in a way I knew. It was the quiet that followed my husband into every room.
Giancarlo stepped out in a black suit, with our son on his hip.
Rocco had his green stuffed T-rex in a headlock and frosting on his chin.
"Mama!"
Giancarlo's eyes went to the guard's hand on my arm.
Then to my things on the floor.
Then to the tab in Grayson's fingers.
He didn't raise his voice. He never had to.
"Take your hands off my wife."
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