Chapter 20: The Garden

The terrace was empty except for a string quartet packing up under the lanterns.

Past it, in the garden, I heard a glass bottle break on stone.

I ran across the grass in my ivory dress, holding the skirt in both fists.

Preston stood in the middle of the gravel path with his tie pulled loose.

Ford stood a few steps from him with his hands open at his sides.

"Boat bum," Preston said. His words were slurred. "You took my company."

"I didn't take anything."

"You took my wife."

"She was never yours, Preston."

Preston swung.

It was a wild punch, from the shoulder, and it caught Ford on the cheekbone with a crack.

Ford's head turned with it.

He did not step back, and he did not raise his hands.

He turned his head slowly to face his nephew again.

There was a thin line of blood at the corner of his mouth.

"That's one," Ford said. "That's the only one you get."

"Fight me!"

"No."

"Fight me, you coward!"

Preston swung again, and I was already there.

I put myself between them, and his fist stopped an inch from my face.

He stared at me.

His eyes were wet and bloodshot, and he smelled like a bar.

"Dess," he said. "Babe. I'm sorry."

"Don't call me that."

"I didn't mean any of it. You know I didn't."

"You meant all of it," I said. "You just didn't think I'd read it."

He lowered his hand.

I looked at his clean jaw, at the face I had loved for fourteen months, and I felt nothing but tired.

"I paid for the lodge you were going to stand in," I said. "You owe the caterer an apology and my mother a phone call."

"Dessa."

"Don't speak to me again. Not at a funeral, not at a table. Not once."

I heard boots on the gravel.

Two hotel guards in black blazers came down the path with a flashlight.

Behind them, the whole quartet had stopped packing, and the people on the terrace were standing at the rail.