Chapter 2 - JULIAN HAD TOLD ME HIS MOTHER ABANDONED HIMThe wedding did not continue normally after that.
There was no elegant way to move two hundred guests past the fact that the bride had assaulted the groom’s mother beside the pool.
Julian helped Lenora out.
Someone brought towels.
The event manager called medical staff already on site.
Lenora had hit the water awkwardly but had no obvious major injury. Her shoulder hurt. Her cheek was swelling from my slap.
I stood five feet away in a wedding dress that suddenly felt like a costume.
“Julian.”
He did not look at me.
“Don’t.”
“I didn’t know.”
His head snapped toward me.
“You didn’t know she was my mother, so throwing her into a pool was acceptable?”
“No.”
That answer had to come immediately.
“No.”
He stared.
I had no defense.
Then I said the only explanation I possessed.
“She destroyed my parents’ marriage.”
Lenora looked at me.
The towel stopped in her hands.
“What?”
“My father.”
She went very still.
“Charles Bellamy.”
Julian looked between us.
“What are you talking about?”
I felt dizzy.
“Your mother had an affair with my father.”
Lenora stared at me.
Then said:
“No.”
Just that.
No outrage.
No performance.
“No.”
My mother appeared behind me.
Evelyn Bellamy wore pale blue silk.
She looked at Lenora.
All the color disappeared from her face.
That was the moment I knew something was wrong with the story I had carried since childhood.
Mom whispered:
“Oh, God.”
Julian heard her.
“What does that mean?”
Mom grabbed my arm.
“Audrey, come inside.”
Julian stepped between us.
“No.”
His voice was shaking.
“Nobody is moving until somebody tells me why my wife thinks my mother slept with her father.”
Lenora closed her eyes.
Then said:
“Julian, this is not how I wanted you to learn any of this.”
He laughed.
A broken sound.
“Learn what?”
I looked at him.
“How could you never tell me your mother was Lenora?”
His expression changed.
“I told you my biological mother’s name was Lenora.”
“You said Lenora Mercer.”
“That’s the name she used after the divorce.”
I had heard the first name.
But I never asked for a photograph.
Julian had none displayed.
He had told me his mother left when he was eleven after “a scandal” and moved west.
His father, Victor Voss, raised him.
His stepmother Cynthia had been the woman I met at family dinners.
Cynthia died three years before Julian and I met.
Whenever I asked about Lenora, Julian became quiet.
“She made choices.”
That was his standard answer.
I understood avoidance.
My family had its own version.
Apparently neither of us had asked enough questions.
The event coordinator cleared the terrace.
Guests were redirected toward the lawn.
Our officiant disappeared discreetly.
The marriage certificate had already been signed after the ceremony.
Legally, Julian and I were married.
Emotionally, we were standing in ruins less than an hour later.
Lenora finally looked at me.
“I never had an affair with your father.”
My mother flinched.
I saw it.
“Mom?”
Evelyn looked toward the floor.
Lenora continued.
“I worked for Bellamy Hospitality.”
“I know.”
“No, you don’t.”
She removed the wet apron.
“I was assistant controller.”
I stared.
Not a maid.
At least not then.
“You were an employee.”
“Yes.”
“And Dad?”
“Was my boss.”
“So you expect me to believe everybody invented the affair?”
Lenora’s eyes moved toward my mother.
“I don’t know what everybody believed.”
Then she looked at me.
“But Charles knew it wasn’t true.”
That sentence cut through everything.
I turned toward Mom.
“Did Dad lie?”
She started crying.
That frightened me more than anger would have.
Julian looked at Lenora.
“Why were you working here today?”
She swallowed.
“I work events now.”
“Why?”
“That’s a longer story.”
“You knew it was my wedding?”
“Not when I accepted the shift.”
“And when you found out?”
Her face broke.
“I stayed because I wanted to see you get married.”
Julian turned away.
He had spent twenty-two years believing his mother chose not to watch him grow up.
Now she stood soaking wet at his wedding saying she had accepted humiliation simply to see him from across a lawn.
He looked back at her.
“You could have called.”
Lenora whispered:
“I did.”
Julian froze.
“When?”
“For years.”
His face changed.
Then Lenora said:
“Your father returned every letter.”
May you like
Across the terrace, Victor Voss had just arrived.
And from the way he stopped when he heard that sentence, I knew she was telling the truth about at least one thing.
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