Chapter 3 - The Empty Sunday Tray
By noon, half of Lake Forest seemed to know the Whitmore wedding had been postponed. Not canceled, Daniel kept correcting me, as though grammar could preserve a future already cracking. I closed the mansion to vendors, called the florist, and told the caterer to freeze our deposit. The staff moved through the rooms with the careful quiet people use around broken glass. Beth cried in my study and said she had warned me Vanessa was unstable. She offered to resign, then seemed relieved when I refused to accept it. That reaction should have troubled me more. Daniel would not let Vanessa leave alone, so I gave them the carriage cottage for seventy-two hours while we decided what came next. He still went with her. That was the first Sunday in sixteen years we missed coffee in the sunroom. I set out the silver tray from habit, then watched two cups cool beside untouched cinnamon toast. By evening, our foundation chair had called twice. She was not asking whether my shoulder hurt. She had heard that Daniel's fiancee mistreated employees in the same mansion scheduled to host next month's donor brunch. The scandal threatened our labor policies, Daniel's standing on the board, and the affordable-housing campaign carrying our name. Then Owen texted Daniel, not me, to ask whether Saturday overtime would be paid. Daniel read the message at my desk and turned the screen facedown. “Beth handles that,” he said. Beth, standing behind him, answered before I could. “Not anymore.” He trusted her.
