Chapter 8: Before the Wedding

Nobody at the table said a word.

"A consulting arrangement," my father said at last. "Camilla helped with the wedding planning. A family firm pays its family."

"For five years," Nonna said. "On a wedding that never happened."

Camilla had both hands over her mouth.

I looked at her across the white cloth.

She looked back, and she did not say a word.

"Nico," she whispered. "Let me explain."

"Tomorrow," I said.

I found I could say it quietly, though I was angry down to my hands.

Gemma took my hand and walked me out.

Nobody stopped us.

On the gravel drive I stood with my arm against the cold roof of my car, and I could not get the key into the lock.

"Give it to me," Gemma said.

She drove.

Neither of us said anything on the road to the bay.

She parked at the boathouse and sat for a second with her hands on the wheel.

"Five years," I said. "I was building a wedding, and my father was paying my fiancée to stall it. Every year. Every party. Every time she said wait."

"I know."

"Do you? Because I didn't, Gemma. I sat in that room, and I thought I was being a patient man."

"You were being a decent one."

"I was a fool."

She got out of the car and came around to my side and opened my door.

"Come inside," she said. "You are shaking."

I was. I hadn't noticed.

In the boathouse she lit the lamp and the stove, and she stood in front of me in the small yellow light, and she put her palms flat on my chest.

"Look at me," she said.

I looked.

"You were not the fool in that room tonight."

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