Chapter 2: The Date He Couldn't Explain
For several seconds, nobody spoke.
The air conditioner hummed above us. Somewhere in the hallway, a hotel employee pushed a housekeeping cart across the carpet, the wheels rattling softly over the threshold of another room.
Ordinary sounds.
An ordinary evening.
Except my entire life had just split into two pieces: everything I had believed before that question, and everything that would come after it.
Marcus was the first to move.
He released Vanessa and took a step toward me.
“Nia, listen to me.””
I lifted my hand.
“Don't come closer.””
He stopped.
Vanessa immediately caught his sleeve.
“Marcus, please. She's upset. We should go somewhere else.””
I turned toward her.
“You've spent months making sure everyone knows you're pregnant, but you've never once mentioned the father by name. You told my mother you were raising this baby alone. You cried at my engagement party because you said the father had abandoned you.””
Vanessa's mouth trembled.
“I was scared.””
“Of what?””
She looked at Marcus.
That was answer enough.
I felt something cold move through my chest.
“Tell me the truth,” I said.
“Both of you. Right now.””
Marcus dragged a hand through his hair.
“It's complicated.””
“No. Complicated is choosing a venue when your mother wants a church wedding and mine wants a garden. Complicated is figuring out how to combine two households. This is a man standing in front of his fiancée while touching another woman's pregnant belly like it's his own.””
“That's not fair,” he said.
I stared at him.
He had actually said it.
Not I didn't sleep with her.
Not the baby isn't mine.
Not even I'm sorry.
He had chosen fairness.
To himself.
Vanessa wiped her cheek. Her fingers carefully avoided the spot where I had slapped her.
“Nia, I never wanted to hurt you.””
“You cut my mother's hair.””
“She provoked me!””
My mother rose unsteadily from the chair.
“I asked her why she was wearing the bracelet I gave Marcus for his thirtieth birthday.””
Everyone turned toward her.
Marcus's face changed.
“What bracelet?”” I asked.
Mom reached into the pocket of her robe and pulled out a tiny photograph. Her hands trembled as she held it toward me.
It showed Vanessa sitting on the edge of a bed, wearing a gold bracelet engraved with Marcus's initials.
I recognized it immediately.
My mother had purchased it for him three years earlier, before she knew Vanessa well enough to distrust her. Marcus had worn it constantly until he claimed the clasp broke during a business trip.
He told us he'd lost it.
“Where did you get that?”” Marcus asked Mom.
“Vanessa's wrist,” Evelyn replied.
“I asked her why she had it. She said Marcus gave it to her.””
Vanessa folded her arms over her belly.
“He did.””
I turned toward my fiancé.
“Why?””
Marcus's jaw tightened.
“It was a gift.””
“A gift you told me was lost?””
“I didn't want an argument over something meaningless.””
I looked at the bracelet in the photograph.
Then at Vanessa.
“Did you sleep with him?””
Vanessa opened her mouth, but Marcus interrupted.
“That's enough.””
I laughed once.
A short, broken sound.
“You don't get to decide when this conversation is enough.””
“Nia, we have guests arriving downstairs. Our families are waiting. We can discuss this privately after the rehearsal dinner.””
“Our families are waiting?”” I repeated.
“That's what you're worried about?””
He stepped toward me again.
“I'm trying to keep this from becoming something we can't take back.””
I looked down at my mother's hair scattered across the floor.
“Something we can't take back happened before I walked through that door.””
For the first time, Marcus looked ashamed.
It wasn't much.
But it was there.
I turned toward the vanity and picked up my phone.
“What are you doing?”” he asked.
“Calling off the wedding.””
His face hardened.
“Don't be ridiculous.””
I unlocked my phone.
“Nia, put it down.””
I pressed my mother's number for the hotel security desk instead.
A moment later, someone answered.
“This is Evelyn Reed's daughter in suite 1812. I need security and a manager. There's been an assault.””
Vanessa's expression twisted.
“An assault? You slapped me!””
“And you cut my mother's hair. I'm not pretending either thing didn't happen.””
Marcus grabbed my wrist.
“Hang up.””
I looked at his hand.
“Let go.””
“Just listen to me for one minute.””
“Let. Go.””
He released me.
I ended the call and turned toward my mother.
“Mom, come with me.””
She nodded, but as she stepped away from the chair, Vanessa suddenly spoke.
“Ask him about the lake house.””
Marcus spun toward her.
“Vanessa, stop.””
My mother went completely still.
I looked at him.
“What lake house?””
Vanessa's breathing grew uneven. She seemed to realize she had revealed something she hadn't intended to reveal, but the damage was already done.
“The one outside Hudson,” she said.
“The one where he took me last summer.””
I remembered the lake house.
Marcus's college friend owned a property near Hudson, New York. Marcus had claimed he spent a long weekend there with a group of friends after a demanding business project.
He'd called me every night.
At least, I thought he had.
“You told me you were with Daniel and the others,” I said.
“I was.””
Vanessa laughed bitterly.
“No, you weren't.””
Marcus seized her arm.
“That's enough!””
She jerked away.
“Don't touch me like I'm the one who lied to her!””
The words struck the room like another slap.
I watched Marcus.
He looked furious with Vanessa, but beneath the anger was something else.
Panic.
“Were you alone with her?”” I asked.
He didn't answer.
“Marcus.””
His gaze dropped to the carpet.
That silence was worse than a confession.
My mother stepped beside me and placed a hand on my shoulder.
“Come on, sweetheart.””
I started toward the door.
Then Marcus spoke.
“The baby isn't the only reason I need to explain myself.””
I stopped.
Vanessa closed her eyes.
Marcus took a breath, then looked directly at me.
“There was something else that happened at the lake house.””
“What?””
He swallowed.
“Vanessa didn't get pregnant by accident.””
The room went silent again.
I stared at him, trying to understand the words.
Then I looked at Vanessa's belly.
“You planned this?””
Vanessa began to cry in earnest.
Marcus rubbed his face.
“It wasn't like that.””
“Then what was it like?””
He glanced toward the door, where two hotel security officers had just arrived.
One of them asked whether everyone was safe.
I barely heard him.
I was watching Marcus.
He looked at me with the desperate expression of a man who had finally run out of excuses.
“I was going to tell you after the wedding,” he whispered.
I felt my knees weaken.
“Tell me what?””
Marcus looked toward Vanessa.
She shook her head frantically.
“Don't,” she whispered.
“You promised.””
And that was when I understood.
Whatever secret they had been hiding, they had both believed they could keep it from me forever.
I had just ruined that plan.
But as the security officers escorted Vanessa into the hallway, she suddenly turned back toward me.
“Nia,” she said, her voice shaking, “before you marry him, you need to know what your mother did twenty-eight years ago.””
My mother stopped breathing.
May you like
Marcus shut his eyes.
And I realized the betrayal might have started long before Vanessa ever entered our lives.
