After Being Accused as a Mistress, I Married My Ex's Uncle novel · Chapter 24 of 24
Chapter 24: Properly
Stanley was waiting on the steps of Saint Anselm's, in a black suit that had lost its fit.
It was a Saturday morning, three weeks after the ballroom, and the Tribune had a reporter at the curb.
I had not asked him to come.
I got out of the car in a plain ivory dress, with my mother's pearls in my ears and my husband's hand in mine.
Stanley looked older.
He held a single typed page, and the page shook.
"Mrs. Kirkbride," he said.
"Cora Ellwood."
He swallowed.
"Cora Ellwood," Stanley said. "I'm here to read a statement. You asked for it. I believe you asked for it from the first night."
"I did."
He lifted the page and read it aloud to the street.
It was short.
He said the woman who was struck at the gala had done nothing wrong.
He said the slap had been arranged by him and by Tabitha Crowe, and that Tabitha now lived with her sister in Joliet and would not be marrying anyone.
He said the family regretted the harm, and he regretted it most, and that he had resigned.
It took a minute and a half.
His voice did not break once, which was the worst part.
When he finished, he held the page out.
I took it, read it from top to bottom, and nodded.
"Thank you," I said.
"Is that all?" Stanley asked.
I thought of two hundred phones, and a coat, and a clasp biting my neck.
"No," I said. "But it's all I need from you."
I passed the page to Romy, who had followed us up the steps in a green velvet dress and a red bandana.
"Frame it," I said.
"Over the stove," Romy said, with great satisfaction.
Stanley went down the steps alone.
Nobody watched him go except the reporter, who wrote it down.
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