I Waited Five Years to Marry Him, Then I Found Out He'd Married My Best Friend novel · Chapter 3 of 24

Chapter 3: Praying for Her

At her sister's house Eliza reads what strangers say about her, turns down Chase's gag offer and calls Greer, who calls her brave; Eli arrives with her boxes and a seat at Thursday's investor lunch.

My sister opened her door in Evanston at ten at night in a bathrobe, took one look at my face and said, "Eat first."

She didn't ask a single question until I had finished a bowl of her soup.

Then I showed her the video.

She watched it twice with her hand over her mouth.

"I'm going to kill him," she said.

"Get in line."

Her kids were asleep upstairs, so she said it in a whisper that was somehow louder than a shout.

I lay on her couch with my phone and read the comments, because I am an idiot.

She looks unwell, poor thing.

That wife is a saint for caring about her.

Imagine crashing a baby's birthday with a ring.

Someone had found my clinic's website, and by midnight there were forty messages in my inbox from strangers.

Two of them were from parents of my patients.

One said, We're praying for you, Nurse Eliza. The other said, We don't want to change clinics, but please tell us you're okay.

I answered both. Then I lay there with my eyes open.

At one in the morning, Chase texted.

Attached was a document with a law firm's name across the top.

It offered me a year of rent at any apartment I chose and a glowing reference to my hospital. In exchange, I would take down any posts, make no statements and sign that the night in the Garden Room had been "a misunderstanding caused by stress."

He had added a line of his own.

Please, Eliza. For your sake. You know how my mother gets.

I read it three times.

Not one word of it was sorry.

I didn't answer him. I called Greer.

She picked up on the second ring.

"Eliza." Her voice was soft and wet. "Oh, thank God. I've been so worried."

"Have you."

"I put that post up to protect you. People are going to be cruel, so I wanted them to be kind first. I know how it looks."

"It looks like you called me sick."

"I called you brave."

I sat up.

On the other end of the line, a baby cried, and she shushed him.

"Greer. Where's your husband?"

The line was quiet for the length of a breath.

"It's complicated," she said. "I'll tell you everything. Come and see me when you've calmed down."

"I'm calm."

"Come and meet Otto. Please."

"I'll see you Thursday," I said, and hung up.

I didn't know yet why I had said Thursday. I only knew that Chase's calendar had said Thursday, 12:00, Ardmore Capital Annual Investor Luncheon, and that I had never been invited to one.

At seven in the morning, someone knocked.

My sister went to the door in her robe with a rolling pin.

It was Eli, with a paper tray of coffees and a bandaged hand.

He stood on her porch with the tray held out in front of him.

"Your boxes," he said. "I didn't want them rattling in the truck all night."

"You're bleeding through your bandage again," I said.

"It'll keep."

My sister looked from him to me and said, "I'm going to go and wake the children. Slowly."

She went.

Eli carried the boxes into the hall and set them down.

I took a coffee. "You came a long way for boxes."

"I came to ask for something."

"Ask."

"The luncheon is Thursday. Twelve o'clock, the Drake Hotel. Two hundred of my family's investors." He put his good hand in his pocket. "I own twenty percent of Ardmore Capital. My father left it to me and Constance has spent twelve years trying to buy it back."

"Why are you telling me?"

"Because Thursday she means to announce a buyout of everyone's shares, mine included, and I'm the only name on the paper that says no."

"And you want me to do what?"

"Walk in on my arm."

I stared at him.

"I'll sit you where Chase has to look at you the whole meal," he said. "And when he stands up to give his speech, you can ask him whatever you like."

"Anything?"

"You came here with a question already. I could see it on your face at the restaurant."

I had one.

I wanted to know, in front of two hundred people, what he had done in Singapore.

I put the coffee down.

"Pick me up at eleven," I said. "I need a dress."

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