“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
“Forget it. The family thing just isn’t something the Mannings and Hillards do. At least not like other families. We don’t get all warm and fuzzy at the holidays or blow out candles and open presents. We share estate planners and probate attorneys—and not much else, unless you count a few threads of DNA.”
“Is that why you’ve never met your aunt?”
He nodded. “Bad blood of some sort. I did meet her kids once when they came to visit, but they didn’t stay long. I can’t even remember their names.”
“You don’t happen to know if she’s still alive, do you?”
“I don’t. I didn’t hear from her when my father died, but then I never tried to contact her. Why?”
“I haven’t read them all the way through, but what I have read feels awfully personal. If Belle does turn out to be your aunt and she’s alive, she might not be thrilled about the intimate details of her love life ending up in the hands of a stranger. Come to think of it, how would your father have ended up with them?”
“No idea. He and Marian used to be close—favorite nephew kind of thing—but they eventually lost touch. Maybe they were a gift.”
Ashlyn ruled out the possibility immediately. Women didn’t generally share those kinds of details with nephews. Even favorite ones. “Is there anyone who might have an address for her? Or a phone number?”
“I doubt it. Last I heard, Marian was persona non grata with the family. Even if she is alive, I doubt she’d be in touch with any of them. My father was really the only one she had contact with. She’d call out of the blue once in a while and they’d catch up, or he’d get a card for his birthday, but after a while even that stopped. Never knew why, but then I never asked. Anyway, are we going to do this? There’s a good chance this whole conversation has been pointless.”
Ashlyn nodded. “Which book do you want first?”
“Let’s go with Belle’s. With any luck, it won’t take long. Doomed romances aren’t exactly my thing.”
Ashlyn handed him Forever, and Other Lies, then realized she’d omitted an important piece of information. “There are inscriptions in both books—one by Belle and one by Hemi—that you really need to read together.”
He glanced up from the book, looking faintly annoyed. “Why?”
Ashlyn bit her lip in an effort to hide her annoyance. He had to be the least curious man she’d ever met. “Because they set up the whole story. Listen . . .” She flipped Regretting Belle open in her lap, pointing to Hemi’s angrily penned line as she read the words aloud. “How, Belle? After everything . . . how could you do it?” She glanced up then, meeting Ethan’s gaze squarely. “He wrote those words directly to her—an accusation and a question. In the book you’re holding, Belle answers him back. Read it and you’ll see what I mean.”
Ethan opened to the inscription, cradling the book in one hand as he read. “How??? After everything—you can ask that of me?” He glanced up, nodding. “Okay, I see what you mean.”
“It’s all like that. Back and forth, like an argument on paper.”
Ethan shot her a tight smile . “I’m just going to read for a bit if that’s okay. See if anything feels familiar.”
He was telling her to be quiet so he could get on with it. And it was a fair request. She’d been grilling him since he walked in, quizzing him about things he’d already told her he didn’t know. If she kept it up, she was going to run him off, and she needed his help.
She returned her attention to Hemi’s inscription. Not the words themselves—she’d committed those to memory on day one—but the way the pen strokes pressed deep into the paper, sharp and jagged, like a wound. The question was why.
Regretting Belle
(pgs. 40–47)
4 November 1941
New York, New York
Discovery is a constant threat. More for you than for me, though I’m keenly aware that I risk Goldie’s wrath if I’m found out. As it is, she’s suspicious about my frequent long lunches and has started keeping tabs on me, like I’m a truant schoolboy. Alibis are harder to come by for us both, rendezvous tricky to arrange. Still, we manage to see one another, living a precarious sort of half-life, detached from reality and all the things we’re not meant to have. We pretend it’s forever, but as the days grow shorter and winter comes on, things change—as we always knew they would.
It’s difficult to pinpoint exactly when things took a turn, but I recall with great clarity the day I suddenly realized they had.
A frigid Tuesday in November. A sky the color of pewter. The threat of snow in the air. You’ve told your sister you’ll be spending the morning at DuBarry, seeing to the fitting of some new dresses you’ve ordered for the season, but you finish the business in less than an hour and are loitering outside William Barthman, pretending to admire a glitzy window display of bracelets, when I just happen to pull up to the curb.
You’ve purchased a pair of gloves, to lend weight to your alibi, and the shopping bag dangles from the crook of your arm. We pretend the meeting is pure chance, though we’ve enacted it many times by now in different locations all over the city. You’ve become quite adept in the art of subterfuge. But then, you were born to play the femme fatale, a consummate actress, worthy of one of those golden statues they hand out every year.
I wind down the window and wave you over, then offer you a ride. You make a show of demurring but soon open the door and slide onto the seat beside me, smiling politely as I pull away from the curb. We drive out to Long Island for lunch, a car picnic of sandwiches in waxed paper bags and coffee in paper cups, procured from the roadside diner we’ve patronized a dozen times before.
It’s a sunless day, too cold for a real picnic. I park the car near the boat launch so we can look out over the lake and finally lean over to kiss you. My head swims as my mouth closes over yours, hungry after nearly a week of not seeing you.
“We don’t have long,” you murmur between kisses. “There’s a dinner party tonight and I’ve got to be back in time to dress.”
I pull away, annoyed. I’ve only just shut off the car and you’re already talking about getting back. There’s always somewhere you’re meant to be, somewhere that requires new clothes and an engraved invitation, somewhere I’m not invited. I blow out a breath, disgusted by my own petulance.
“Your father’s quite the entertainer,” I say, staring at the lake through the windscreen. “Who is it tonight? I’d say Roosevelt, but I know better than to think your old man would invite the president of the United States into his study for cognac and cigars.”
You lift your chin, piqued by my tone. “Why would you say that?”