Kelly touched her hand. “Marin, you have to promise me—swear to me—that you won’t tell Amelia.”
“What? Kelly, you have to tell her. You can’t just blindside her one day, months from now. She needs to know what’s going on.” She couldn’t imagine Amelia without Kelly. With their twenty-year age difference, Amelia surely had always assumed she would be the one leaving Kelly behind. She had no doubt planned for that.
Not for this.
“I’m not going to blindside her. But I do want to enjoy this Fourth of July—and I want her to as well. Because it will be our last together.”
Chapter Twenty-Six
Happy Fourth of July!” A waiter uncorked a bottle of champagne in Sandra Crowe’s foyer.
“Fancy, fancy,” Nadine said.
There was no kitschy Fourth of July décor in sight. The house was all white and beige and cream.
“It’s a good house,” said Amelia. “Strong bones. Not my taste, but these high ceilings do make for a dramatic space. So where’s your piece, hon? I can’t wait to see it.”
Kelly glanced around. “The dining room, I think? Sandra will show us, I’m sure.”
“Unbelievable what rich people will waste their money on. Never fails to amaze me,” said Nadine.
Kelly threw Amelia a look and said, “Okay. Well, then—I’m off to find the bar. Anyone else need a vodka shot?”
Amelia wanted everyone to get along. It was Kelly’s favorite summer holiday. And now Nadine was being sour and threatening to spoil it. Her daughter obviously had mixed feelings about being back, and that was understandable. Kelly just had no patience for it, which was unlike her.
Something was up with Kelly. Amelia had been eager to talk to her all day about Blythe’s revelation. She’d been involved with Nick! But Kelly had made herself scarce, skipping the parade and instead taking a long solo bike ride to the beach. When she finally got back, she had barely enough time to shower and change for the dinner party, never mind have a long conversation. And now they were at the party and she was already drifting away.
Maybe she was just trying to give Amelia space to reconnect with Nadine. But it was impossible to entirely focus on Nadine when it was Blythe and Marin’s last night. She hated to admit it to herself, but Blythe’s confession that morning affected the way she felt toward Marin; she wasn’t just the product of an anonymous sperm donation. She was a love child. Nick’s love child!
“There you are!” Sandra breezed into the entrance hall, her outstretched, beckoning arms covered in chunky gold bracelets. “The guest of honor!”
She gave Kelly the European two-kiss greeting. Then she turned to Amelia and took one of her hands in both of hers. “It is so lovely of you to make it. Thank you for sharing your magnificent, talented wife with me. I am in love with the piece—in love.”
“Amelia taught me everything I know,” Kelly said.
Sandra clapped her hands together. “You two are adorable.” She turned to Nadine and introduced herself.
“Oh, I’m sorry—where are my manners?” Amelia jumped in and made the round of introductions.
“Are you ready to see my mermaid?” Sandra said. “I’ve named her: Ariel. The Little Mermaid! One of my favorite movies,” she said.
“The cartoon?” said Nadine incredulously.
Amelia bit her lip to keep from smiling.
“What do you think?” Sandra asked Kelly. Amelia knew what Kelly was undoubtedly thinking: that Sandra had turned her mythical Siren into a Disney character.
Before Kelly could respond, Sandra said, “We’re still on for you to do the window in my master bathroom, right? If anyone here tonight tries to steal you away from me, you just let me know. They’ll have to wait their turn.”
Amelia squeezed Kelly’s hand.
“Sure,” said Kelly.
“How soon can you start?”
“I have one piece before it. But I can come measure the window soon and we can talk about color and design.”
“Fabulous! This weekend?”
Kelly hesitated, then said, “Sure. Why not.”
Sandra snapped her fingers at Tanya. “Gather everyone in the dining room.”
Amelia, Kelly, Nadine, and the girls followed Sandra across the foyer into a cavernous room with a marble table that could seat twenty. On the farthest wall, behind the head seat of the table, was Kelly’s mosaic. It looked absolutely magnificent, dramatic in the space. The room, painted oxblood, picked up all the deep tones of the piece.
Waiters handed them flutes of champagne. Behind them, voices of the other party guests filled the hall.
“Everyone, gather round,” Sandra sang out, moving a chair out of the way so she could stand at the head of the table. “I’m so delighted to have you all here to celebrate the Fourth of July. Tonight, we have a special guest, the brilliant artist Kelly Hanauer. This fabulous piece behind me is her work, so, Kelly, why don’t you come up here and tell us a little bit about it.”
Kelly looked at Amelia, a deer in headlights.
“Might as well get it over with,” Amelia murmured to her.
“If I’d known this was going to be a dog-and-pony show, I would never have come.”
“It’s the price of doing business, my dear,” Amelia said. “I’ll hold your drink.”
Kelly reluctantly walked to the front of the table and stood next to Sandra.
“Thanks, Sandra. I’m so happy to see it in this space—you gave her a perfect home. As you can all see, the design is a mermaid, and she’s formed from a combination of materials including stones, shells, mother-of-pearl, stained glass…”
Across the room, Amelia saw Nadine and Marin talking. Amelia’s vision blurred, and for a fraction of a second, it was Nadine and Nick.
Her heart beat fast at the thought of the last time she’d seen her children together. They’d come at her like wolves, Nick shouting, Nadine crying and breaking things. Had she deserved it? Yes. When parents hurt their children, purposefully or not, they get what they get.
The first fear, her immediate thought when Nick discovered her with Kelly, was that he would tell Otto. Oh, how foolish she’d been. As if her marriage mattered at all in the big picture. By that time, it was already over. They were both drifting, going through the motions. Still, the horror she’d felt at the thought of him learning of her affair. It was funny how much time one wasted worrying about the wrong things.
In the end, Otto had forgiven her. And when he died, she’d genuinely mourned him. Without her family, because Nick was gone by that time and Nadine did not come home to bury her father. Even for that unjustifiable, selfish act, Amelia blamed herself. She had set the family adrift, and so in the end it all came back to her.
Yes, Otto had forgiven her. But Nick…
“I love her,” he’d spit.
“Love who?” Amelia had asked, genuinely bewildered. The conversation took place in the kitchen the day after Nick had walked in on her and Kelly.
“Kelly!”
“What? Since when?”