Chapter 1 - Six Hours Before the Glass Fell
At seven fifteen that morning, Audrey had believed her greatest problem was a cake.
The three-tier lemon cake sat in the refrigerator beside bottles of champagne, trays of strawberries, and enough catered food to serve fifty people.
There were supposed to be forty-two guests.
Marianne had invited seventy-three.
Audrey discovered that fact while standing barefoot in the kitchen with Nora balanced on one hip and Ethan's phone wedged between her shoulder and cheek.
"Seventy-three?"
Ethan groaned from the other end of the call.
He was driving back from the airport after collecting his uncle Robert.
"That's what Vivian just texted me."
Audrey closed her eyes.
"Your mother told me this was a small family lunch."
"To Marianne, seventy-three is intimate."
"Your family has a strange relationship with numbers."
That earned the laugh Audrey had been trying to get from him.
She loved Ethan's laugh.
It was one of the reasons she'd married him.
The ceremony had happened four months earlier at a courthouse two counties away. No photographers. No champagne tower. No Bennett family attorneys. Just Audrey, Ethan, baby Nora, two witnesses, and a judge who kept losing his glasses.
They had planned to announce the marriage gradually.
Then Ethan's father suffered a heart attack.
Then Robert's business collapsed.
Then Nora developed a fever.
Then Marianne decided to organize a "welcome home gathering" after spending six months in Europe.
Somehow, four months had passed and Ethan still had not told his mother.
Audrey reminded him every week.
Ethan always answered the same way.
"I will."
Audrey believed him.
Mostly.
Nora grabbed the phone.
"No, ma'am," Audrey said, rescuing it from tiny fingers. "Daddy is already difficult enough to understand without drool in the microphone."
"I heard that," Ethan said.
"You were meant to."
His voice softened.
"I'll be home in twenty minutes."
"Promise?"
"Promise."
The call ended.
Audrey placed Nora in the high chair and stared at the kitchen.
The Cole house had twelve rooms, seven bathrooms, a library nobody used, two offices Ethan did use, a wine cellar Audrey had accidentally locked herself inside once, and a kitchen larger than the apartment where she had spent most of her twenties.
She still did not feel entirely comfortable there.
The house had belonged to Ethan's grandmother, Eleanor Cole.
After Eleanor died, it passed to Ethan.
At least that was what everyone said.
Marianne never seemed to accept it.
Although she lived three states away, she still referred to the property as "the family house."
She changed furniture without asking.
She hired gardeners without telling Ethan.
Once, she sent decorators who removed photographs of Audrey and replaced them with framed pictures of Ethan's first wife, Rebecca.
Audrey had quietly put her photographs back.
She had never met Rebecca.
Rebecca had died three years before Audrey met Ethan.
Cancer.
Thirty-one years old.
Ethan rarely spoke about the final months, but Audrey understood that grief had nearly destroyed him.
They met because Audrey had been temporarily helping her aunt's housekeeping company after losing her job as a preschool administrator.
She arrived at the Cole house one rainy Tuesday expecting to clean an empty mansion.
Instead she found Ethan sitting on the kitchen floor beside six-month-old Nora, both of them crying.
The nanny had quit.
Ethan had not slept.
Nora refused formula.
Audrey spent three hours helping him.
Then another day.
Then a week.
Eventually she stopped being the woman from the housekeeping company and became the person Ethan called whenever Nora wouldn't sleep.
Friendship followed.
Love came slowly.
Marianne never forgave either of them.
The doorbell rang at seven thirty-eight.
Audrey looked toward the entryway.
"Please don't be your grandmother," she whispered to Nora.
Nora slapped the high-chair tray.
The doorbell rang again.
Audrey opened the door.
Marianne stood outside wearing oversized sunglasses and carrying no luggage.
She wore cream trousers, expensive sandals, and a floral silk blouse Audrey would later remember with painful clarity.
"You're still here," Marianne said.
"Good morning to you too."
Marianne stepped past her.
"Where's Ethan?"
"Picking up Robert."
"And Vivian?"
"Coming at ten."
Marianne removed her sunglasses.
Her eyes traveled down Audrey's clothes.
Audrey wore leggings and one of Ethan's old university shirts.
"You might want to change before people arrive."
Audrey shut the door.
"I was planning to."
"Into something appropriate."
"I was planning that too."
Marianne walked toward the kitchen.
Audrey followed.
She hated that she followed.
It made her feel like a guest in her own house.
Marianne stopped beside the island.
"Where are the flowers?"
"Dining room."
"The orchids?"
"Dining room."
"The white ones?"
Audrey counted silently.
One.
Two.
Three.
"Dining room."
Marianne opened the refrigerator.
Her face tightened.
"What is that?"
"The cake."
"I ordered chocolate."
"Ethan wanted lemon."
"This party is for Ethan's family."
Audrey finally looked directly at her.
"It is Ethan's house."
A small silence followed.
Marianne closed the refrigerator.
"That remains to be seen."
Audrey frowned.
"What does that mean?"
Marianne smiled.
"Nothing."
But it did not feel like nothing.
At eight eleven, Ethan finally came home.
Audrey heard his voice in the hallway and felt her shoulders relax.
Then another voice followed.
Robert Bennett.
Ethan's uncle.
A man Audrey had met only twice.
Robert entered the kitchen wearing a navy blazer and a smile too warm to be sincere.
"There she is."
He hugged Audrey without waiting for permission.
"Still keeping our Ethan alive?"
"I try."
Robert laughed.
Ethan entered behind him.
The moment he saw Audrey, his entire face softened.
He crossed the kitchen and kissed her.
Not a friendly kiss.
Not one Marianne could misunderstand.
Audrey felt Marianne watching.
Ethan touched Nora's hair.
"How are my girls?"
Marianne opened a cabinet hard enough to make the glasses shake.
Robert looked between them.
Audrey expected Ethan to finally say it.
Mom, Audrey and I got married.
Five words.
That was all.
Instead Ethan glanced toward Robert and said, "I need to show Uncle Robert something in the study."
Audrey's heart dropped.
"Now?"
"It'll take five minutes."
He kissed her forehead.
"Then I'm yours."
He left.
Marianne watched him go.
Then she turned to Audrey.
"Four months."
Audrey stiffened.
Marianne lowered her voice.
"You didn't think I knew?"
Audrey's pulse quickened.
"Knew what?"
May you like
Marianne smiled.
"Everything."
