They Excluded Me From the Family, So I Built a New One novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: Not Your Darling

"The Portland account has been frozen," Rosalie read aloud, in a voice I had never heard from her.

She said it to nobody.

The nephew set down his fork very quietly.

"It says the bank's lawyers filed this morning," she went on. "It says every recent transfer is under review."

"They are," said the attorney.

Rosalie lifted her head.

"You did this."

"The bank did it. I only made sure they had the pictures."

The fiancé's father spoke for the first time that afternoon.

"Mrs. Pierce," he said. "My wife and I would like to know where our ninety thousand dollars was meant to go."

"You haven't sent it."

"No. And now we won't." He folded his napkin. "But I'd like to hear you say what you were going to do with it."

She looked at him.

Then she looked at the long pine table and the people sitting at it.

None of them were smiling.

"You don't understand," she said.

"Then explain it."

"I had a family to feed."

"Your daughter says you had a wedding planner who never heard of you."

"Kenzie will forgive me." She turned. "Kenzie, baby, you will, won't you? I'm your mother."

Kenzie put down her fork.

"I'm going to love you from a distance, Mom," she said. "You're going to have to be someone I can stand next to first."

Rosalie's hand went to her throat.

"That's cruel."

"It's the nicest thing I can say."

The silence went on a moment too long.

Then Libby pushed back her chair.

I hadn't expected it, and neither had Kenzie.

She stood at the table in her college sweatshirt, a little pale and with her hands in fists.

"Mrs. Pierce," she said. "Can I say something?"

"Libby, darling."

"I'm not your darling."

Rosalie stopped.

"You showed me screenshots," Libby said. "You said my aunt was tired of me. You said she was going to sell the house and put me in a studio apartment so she wouldn't have to see me anymore. And I believed you for two weeks."

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