Chapter 2 - A Name That Was Buried
The orchestra played three more seconds, then stopped.
"Take Ivy upstairs," Preston ordered.
"She stays with me," Adrian replied.
Celia set down her glass. "People are filming. Think about what this will do to the company."
Adrian looked at his daughter, who was still hugging Lena. "Right now, I don't give a damn about the company."
He led them into the empty conservatory, leaving two hundred guests whispering behind the ballroom doors. Celia followed, as did Preston and the head of venue security, Miles Porter.
Under the yellow lights, Adrian saw the scar beneath Lena's eyebrow. As a boy, he'd asked if it was a moon. She'd laughed and blamed a kitchen cabinet.
"Tell me something only my mother would know," he said.
Lena swallowed. "When thunder scared you, you'd count backward from twelve because you thought storms couldn't understand reverse numbers. You called our dog Captain Pickles, even though his real name was Duke."
Adrian gripped the back of a chair.
"And every night," she continued, "you knocked twice on the wall between our rooms. I'd knock back three times so you'd know I was there."
Two knocks. Three in return.
He hadn't thought about that in years.
"They told me you died," Adrian said. "There was a service. A closed casket."
"There was no body," Lena said. "Your father made sure you never asked why."
Preston gave a hard laugh. "She's rehearsed this. She's been trying to get money out of us for years."
"Then why didn't you call her by name when you saw her?" Adrian asked. "Why did you call security?"
Preston didn't answer.
Ivy reached into the tiny purse tied to her wrist and handed Adrian a worn library card. On the back, in careful handwriting, were the words LENA MARSH - THURSDAY STORY HOUR.
"Grandma says books are places nobody can lock you out of," Ivy said.
Celia's expression tightened. "That woman approached your daughter without telling you? Adrian, that's frightening."
"My late wife knew her," Adrian said. "Ivy just told us."
"Nora was very sick toward the end," Preston said softly. "She wasn't always thinking clearly."
Adrian's stare made his father step back.
"You don't get to use my wife's illness to win an argument."
Lena took a folded slip of paper from her uniform pocket. It was a delivery receipt from the wedding suite, stamped that afternoon.
"The document in that room transfers your voting rights in the Riverbend housing trust," she said. "Once you sign, they can tear down Ash Street House tomorrow."
Celia stared at the receipt.
May you like
Adrian saw her expression and understood something ugly.
"Celia," he asked quietly, "how does my mother know what's in a document you said was our marriage paperwork?"
