Chapter 10: Nothing To Give

Langston's POV

I went back to the gala because I did not know where else to go.

The ballroom was still full.

Three hundred people in evening clothes were eating the dessert Flora had ordered, under the lights she had hung, to the jazz she had booked.

Nobody mentioned the ceremony.

Everybody looked at me.

Lydia found me at the bar.

She had changed out of the dress and into green silk, and her smile did not reach her eyes.

"Where did you go?"

"The cottage."

"Langston." She put her hand on my sleeve. "You told me you'd handle her."

"She's ending the marriage."

"She's ending the hotel."

I stared at her.

"Flora knows," Lydia said. "Cushing told her. I watched him leave with his folder."

My mother was on the terrace, speaking to a reporter with a glass in her hand.

She saw my face and finished the sentence she was saying.

Then she took me by the elbow and walked me into the library, and shut the door.

"Whatever she's done," my mother said, "I'll fix it. Sit down."

I sat.

I had planned to tell her in pieces, after Friday, with a drink in her hand and a good number on the table.

I had never planned to tell her tonight, in a dinner jacket, with my tie hanging open.

"Mom. Flora owns the hotel."

Keep reading free with an account. Start I Was Counting Down To Leave Him from Chapter 1, then sign up free to read the rest of this chapter.