Chapter 22: Lights Down

"Excuse me," I said.

I did not say it loudly.

The room had gone quiet to enjoy the toast, and my voice carried to the back wall.

"Yvette promised the room something tonight," I said. "She said she'd stand up here and say it herself. She's changed her mind."

Yvette laughed, lightly, and touched her throat.

"Jude's had a very hard month," she said to the nearest tables. "He isn't himself. Someone sit with him, please."

It was what she had said at the wedding, with the same sad smile.

Two hundred people had believed her then.

"Sit down, Yvette," said the chairman.

He said it mildly, from his chair, without looking at her.

The room heard it.

I walked to the aisle.

"Hazel," I said. "The lights."

At the back of the ballroom the chandeliers dimmed.

The big screen over the stage, which had been showing the Linden Freight logo, went white and then black.

A photograph appeared on it.

It showed a garden and a white arch.

A woman in a cream dress held lavender, and a man in a navy suit cried beside her.

Under it, in a neat blue hand, was written: Mr. and Mrs. Kohler. Garden room. September 14.

A murmur ran through the tables.

"That's Brodie," somebody said.

"That's the director," said someone else.

Yvette stood up.

"This is a private matter," she said.

Keep reading free with an account. Start Forgotten Groom in the Back Alley from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.