Chapter 6
"I mean it respectfully.
But right now I am speaking to your daughter.
Please stop talking."
The silence that followed was the loudest thing that had happened all morning.
Gerald Whitmore was not a man who was told to stop talking.
Not in boardrooms.
Not in his own home.
Certainly not by a man his daughter had found and introduced to the family as a promising young architect from a good school with, Gerald had noted privately, no family of consequence to complicate things.
He now understood that assessment had been incomplete.
Celestine reached out and touched Derrick's hand.
"Baby," she said.
"Don't fight on my account."
"Mom—"
"I didn't come here for a fight." She looked at Vanessa.
"I came because I found out my son was getting married and I hadn't seen his face in six years.
I just wanted to see his face." She paused.
"I would have stood in the back.
I wouldn't have said a word.
I just needed to see him standing up there."
Something passed across Vanessa's face.
It was brief.
She pushed it away.
"How did you find out about the wedding?" she asked.
Celestine glanced at someone.
It was a small glance, involuntary, quickly corrected.
Vanessa caught it.
She turned and followed the line of that glance to the third row, where Uncle Raymond stood with his hands still folded and his eyes on the floor.
"Raymond," Vanessa said.
Raymond looked up.
"You told her."
It was not a question.
Raymond met her gaze and didn't flinch.
"She's his mother," Raymond said simply.
"She had a right to know."
Vanessa turned back to Derrick.
"Did you know he told her?"
"No."
"Do you believe him?"
"Yes.
I believe him."
She studied Derrick's face for a long moment.
He held her gaze.
He owed her that much.
"I need some air," she said.
She picked up the hem of her dress and walked toward the side corridor.
Her mother moved to follow.
May you like
Vanessa held up one hand without turning around.
She went alone.
