Chapter 13 #2
I just have to get through today. Tomorrow is the rehearsal dinner, and then the wedding, and soon after, Simon and I will be heading home. Returning to our lives far from this place. And all of this will be forgotten.
I focus on tying the delicate silk bows in the way Rachelle showed me this morning, my fingers sticky from the double-sided tape by the time I’ve finished. The room smells of the rose candles Simon has going, with a hint of something else floral coming in through the open windows.
I glance over my shoulder, where Simon is working across the room.
On top of a ladder, he’s hanging string lights, his shirt half untucked, and there’s a smidge of glitter on his jaw from the garland now covering most surfaces.
The sight makes me smile, and makes me miss him, even from just a few feet away.
I turn, resting my hand on the mantel where a chipped place has been painted over.
“You’re crooked,” I call, just wanting to see that grin pointed in my direction.
I get my wish as he glances down, beaming. “You’re just jealous I’m winning.”
“Winning?” I knit my brows at him. “This isn’t a competition.”
He gives a small shrug. “If it were, I’d be winning.”
I wrinkle my nose. “You wish.”
He stretches up on his toes, revealing even more of the dark hair on his stomach, to hang the lights in place. Leaning back to admire his handiwork, he rubs his palms together. “Look at those lights.”
“Look at these bows.” I hold one out, glowing.
He sighs, rolling his eyes. “All right, fine. I guess they’re okay.”
I give a pleased humph and step back to admire the work we’ve done. The archway we spent most of the morning decorating, the greenery throughout the room. White roses, strings of pearls. It’s almost painfully beautiful.
Simon climbs down the ladder, dusting his hands.
“We do good work, Lee.” He winks, using my last name in a way that sends a tingle down my spine.
He’s one of the only people who still calls me by my legal last name.
One of the only people who knows how much it means to me.
How I still need to feel connected to Mom, even if we rarely speak. “We’re a good team.”
My smile is soft. Sadder than I mean for it to be.
“You’ve been quiet all morning.” His voice is cautious, tiptoeing around what neither of us have brought up. “Very unlike you.”
“I’m…just embarrassed. I want your family to like me, and I know I’ve completely screwed that up.”
His face goes blank, confused. “They love you. You know that.” Then, a wicked grin. “Mom likes you more than she likes Duncan. Probably equal with how much she likes me.”
I scowl. “You’re impossible. And anyway, I don’t want that. I just don’t want them to hate me. Your mom’s already weird about the fact that I didn’t change my name, and now all of this. I’m just…frustrated, worried. I don’t know.”
He wraps an arm around my shoulders, dragging me against his chest. He rests his chin on top of my head. “Hey, they love you. Nothing could change that. You’re one of us—like it or not.” He kisses my temple, then leans back. “Besides, could this really be worse than the first time you met them?”
I wince, squeezing my eyes closed. “When your dad thought I was the help?”
He raps my shoulder with his fist. “Exactly. You took that like a champ.”
“I hid in the pantry.”
He snorts. “But you came out.”
I shake my head, rolling my eyes. Somehow, this is, in fact, worse, but I appreciate him not making it feel that way.
“Besides, I can’t live without you.” He tucks a piece of hair behind my ear, his eyes serious. “You know that, right?”
I smirk, eyeing the lights. “In this moment? Because I’m the only one who can save you if you get electrocuted?”
His smile goes wide, wiping away the last hint of my worry.
“Exactly.” He takes the bow from my hand, his fingers brushing mine in a slow, deliberate way, and carefully places it on the empty space of the garland around the window.
When he comes back to look at me, he says, “You belong here. You’re a Morning. You’re my Morning.”
The words slam squarely into my chest. I blink up at him, this beautiful man of mine who has always believed—from the moment we met—that love is more important than money, pedigrees, and legacy. I so badly want to believe it too, even if it’s harder some days.
Most days.
Simon crosses the room and presses a button on the remote. The string lights flicker to life, washing the room in soft gold. He looks at me like I’m part of the glow—the cause of it maybe—and I smile back, drawing in a steady breath. My body hums under his gaze.
The sound of truck doors slamming outside cuts through our moment. Simon glances toward the window, flicking off the string lights. “Movers are here.”
“Perfect timing.”
He smacks my bottom. “Not what I’d call it.”
Within a few minutes, the house is filled with men in green shirts, the air thick with the smell of dust and sweat and the scrape of furniture legs against hardwood.
They move around the boxes with ease, wrapping each piece of furniture before carrying it out of the house.
The idea of hiring movers for a single event—to remove and then return your furniture so it can be out of the way—is unfathomable to me.
I wonder which anniversary will bring the realization I’ve gotten used to the quirks that come with being the kind of wealthy that makes things like this seem ordinary.
Simon gives directions, politely but firmly, standing close to me until he’s needed. I remain in the corner near the fireplace, keeping out of the way and trying not to notice how easily he sinks into every situation. I’ve never known that kind of ease, that sort of peace.
When they heave the sofa from the center of the room, there’s a loud CRACK. I flinch. Release my breath. The men drop the sofa with a start, confused.
At once, we all move closer.
“What was that?” Simon asks, dropping down to look underneath it. The men scoot the sofa back carefully, cautiously. From where I’m standing, I see the source of the noise at the same time they do. A corner of the floorboard has been pried up, slightly askew. The sofa’s leg caught on it.
“Sorry about that,” one of the men says, chewing his bottom lip as he waits to see how Simon will react.
There’s no doubt in my mind my perfectly calm husband will react with nothing but grace. He pushes up, sitting back on his knees. “No big deal. You guys keep going. Easy fix.” He disappears down the hall as the men grab the sofa, carrying it out the door.
Left alone, I cross the room and bend down next to the floorboard. I pry it up and over, seeing how easily it will slide back into place.
Below, metal glints in the light. I shove the board aside, so I can see down into the small hollow—just a narrow space. Empty except for a thin chain attached to a golden, heart-shaped locket. The metal is dull and tarnished with age.
Carefully, I lower my hand into the space, looping a finger through the chain. As I raise it closer to my face, I can see the faint engraved letter.
My pulse speeds up, racing in my ears, under my skin.
I trace a finger across it.
My heart skips. “No. It can’t… It…”
Simon kneels beside me, brushing dust from my sleeve after setting the hammer down. He leans over, trying to see what I’m holding. “What’s that?”
“I found it under the floorboard. L. It says L. Could it be for…Lia?”
To his credit, Simon doesn’t sigh, and he doesn’t laugh. He hesitates, brow furrowed. “Her necklace? No. Come on. Honey, that was ages ago. It could be anyone’s. This was the original house on the property, before the main house. People drop things, floorboards shift.”
I hold it tighter, feeling the cool weight against my palm. “But it was hidden. Someone hid it under the floorboard. We should ask your parents. Do you think they’d know? Maybe they’d remember her wearing it.”
He presses his lips together, eyes flicking down to the locket. “Let me see.”
The moment of hesitation is painful for us both until I place it into his waiting palm. The chain coils like a thin snake. He studies it for several seconds, then, as we hear the voices of the movers drawing closer, he slips it into his pocket.
“What are you doing?”
“I’ll ask Dad about it later,” he says. “We have work to do, and I need to fix this.”
“But—”
He’s already on the floor, pressing the floorboard back into place, hammering it down. Pausing just once, he looks over his shoulder at me. “Come on. We’ve got a wedding to get ready for, hmm?”
The movers start hauling the boxes through the doorway, sunlight spilling across the empty spaces they’ve left behind. The room feels vast, cavernous. As Simon hammers the floorboard back into place, something tightens deep in my chest.
I wanted to let it go, I really did. But I have to know.
I have to.
In minutes, he’s moved on, giving directions again, chatting and laughing with the men as if nothing’s changed.
But everything has changed…hasn’t it? How could it ever be the same?