“I thought—”
“You thought I was capable of destroying someone you loved.
Then you decided the proper response was to spend fourteen months pretending to love me.”
“At first I was pretending.”
Katherine’s eyes narrowed.
Caleb looked desperate now.
“Then it became real.
I swear.
I did love you.
I do love you.”
The cruelty of that confession seemed to hurt Katherine more than his earlier anger.
“And you still did this.”
Caleb began crying again.
“I couldn’t let go of what Beatrice told me.”
“Then you should have let go of me.”
He had no answer.
Grace walked to Katherine and stopped several feet away, remembering how the young woman had recoiled when she first entered the bedroom.
“Katherine,” she said softly, “I won’t touch you unless you want me to.
But you are not staying in this room tonight.”
Katherine looked at her.
Grace continued.
“And Caleb is not going near you.”
Caleb stared at his mother.
“Mom.”
Grace faced him.
“No.”
It was the first time that night her voice shook.
“You are my son.
I love you.
But I will not turn that love into an excuse for what you did.”
Caleb looked as though she had struck him.
Grace did not take the words back.
Frank packed Katherine’s overnight things.
Robert collected the recorder and left it untouched on the dresser until Katherine decided what she wanted done with it.
Grace took photographs of the room only after asking Katherine’s permission.
Katherine spent the rest of the night in the guest room with the door locked from inside.
Grace sat outside in a hallway chair until sunrise.
Neither woman slept.
Just after six, Katherine opened the door.
Her wedding dress was gone.
She wore sweatpants and one of Grace’s old cardigans that Frank had found in the laundry room.
She looked twenty years older than she had beneath the string lights the evening before.
“I’m leaving,” she said.
Grace nodded.
“Robert will drive you wherever you want.”
Katherine hesitated.
“I need to speak to a lawyer.”
“Then we’ll take you to one.”
Caleb emerged from the kitchen.
Grace immediately stood.
He stopped at the sight of Katherine.
“Can I have one minute?”
Katherine shook her head.
“No.”
“I just want to explain.”
“You had fourteen months to explain.”
