Neglected by My Husband and Left in the Fire for Her

Prologue

Audrey

My husband came down the steps with another woman in his arms.

I was still upstairs.

Through the open window, beyond the smoke catching in my throat, I could see the familiar bend of his head. He was listening to her. Even now, with the house burning behind him, he was listening.

Twenty minutes earlier, I had wanted him to look at my dress.

That seemed an embarrassingly small thing to have wanted, considering what happened afterward.

The dress was midnight blue, cut low across my back, and expensive enough that buying it had required an argument with myself. I had won. For once, I wanted to attend a Bennett function without looking as though I had come to check the plaster.

I had checked the plaster anyway.

An eighteenth-century cornice above the ballroom doors still carried the faint outline of a repair. Nobody else would notice it. I had spent three afternoons persuading the restoration team not to erase the original tool marks.

Now winter branches tapped the windows of Bennett House, and a quartet played something brisk enough to compete with the champagne. Beyond the glass lay Weston, black lawns and bare trees, Boston half an hour away if the roads stayed clear.

Ethan stood beneath the chandelier, one hand around a microphone.

“And Vivian,” he said, turning toward the woman beside the stage. “Who has somehow managed to make the impossible look effortless.”

Applause rose around me.

Vivian Blake pressed her fingers to her throat, smiling as though she had been caught doing something kind in secret. Her ivory gown looked almost silver beneath the lights.

I waited.

Eighteen months. Three sets of revised drawings. A summer spent arguing about damp behind the library walls while Ethan sent photographs from hotels I had never seen.

He thanked his mother.

He thanked the donors.

Then the quartet began again.

A man beside me leaned toward his wife. “Beautiful job. Apparently Vivian coordinated the whole thing.”

I drank enough champagne to make my empty stomach protest.

Ethan found me near the terrace doors a few minutes later. His thumb brushed the inside of my wrist as he straightened my bracelet.

“There you are.”

“Here I've been.”

His eyes finally traveled over me. Slowly. The crowded room seemed to contract to the warmth of his hand.

“That dress,” he murmured.

“Yes. It has been receiving excellent reviews from the coat-check staff.”

His mouth shifted. “Are you angry with me?”

“I haven't decided whether to invoice you first.”

“For what?”

I looked toward the restored ceiling.

Understanding came late enough to sting.

“Audrey.” He lowered his voice. “I thought you didn't like being put on display.”

“Being credited and being displayed aren't the same thing.”

“I know. I should have—”

“Ethan?”

Vivian approached with two glasses and the expression she wore whenever his attention had wandered somewhere inconvenient.

“The Wetherbys are asking about the scholarship figures. I told them you'd explain the expansion.”

“Send them to Martin,” he said.

My fingers tightened around his.

Then she added, “It's the commitment we discussed yesterday. I'd rather not get it wrong.”

Yesterday. The evening he had said he was still at the office while I ate our anniversary dinner beside two untouched candles.

I had learned later that the office meant Vivian's office. There had been takeout. She had posted a photograph of the little white cartons with a caption about saving the world after hours.

I had never mentioned the photograph.

“Ten minutes,” Ethan told me.

“You promised me a dance.”

“I know.” He kissed my temple. “Save it for me.”

Then he went with her.

I watched his hand settle briefly at her elbow as they crossed the room. A courteous gesture. That was what he would call it. There was a courteous explanation for everything.

For leaving my presentation last September because Vivian had been upset about a donor complaint.

For answering her call during the weekend we had rented a cabin, then driving back early because she shouldn't handle the problem alone.

For remembering how she took her coffee while asking whether I still drank mine black.

I hadn't for two years.

Once, during an argument I regretted having apologized for, I had asked whether he wanted her.

“Don't do that,” he'd said. “She's family.”

Apparently family was whoever could interrupt his wife.

At Christmas, Vivian had sat beside him while I fetched a serving dish from the kitchen. When I returned, she was showing him photographs on her phone, her shoulder pressed against his. My place card had moved to the other end of the table.

“It's only dinner,” he'd said afterward when I asked why he hadn't noticed.

Only dinner. Only a call. Only an old friend who needed him.

The word had worn grooves through our marriage.

Tonight I had wanted something that could not be reduced that way. His hand held out in front of everyone. A dance he stayed for. A thank-you that acknowledged I had been doing more than choosing curtains.

Across the ballroom, Vivian touched his lapel to remove something I couldn't see. He lowered his head automatically, granting her the small domestic intimacy without a thought.

I turned away before either of them could catch me watching.

I set down my glass before I could break its thin stem.

A server passed with miniature pastries smelling of butter and mushrooms. I took one and ate it without tasting it. Across the room, Vivian laughed. Ethan bent closer to hear her.

If I stood beside another man that way, would he notice?

The thought frightened me less than the possibility that he wouldn't.

“Audrey.”

Vivian had returned alone. I hadn't seen her cross the room.

“Those earrings are lovely.”

“Thank you.”

“Ethan chose them?”

“I did.”

“Oh.” Her smile held. “You've always been wonderfully self-sufficient.”

Before I could answer, someone moved behind her. Vivian's glass tipped, and cold wine struck my chest.

I gasped.

“Oh, God. I'm so sorry.”

Red spread across the blue silk. Her free hand had remained perfectly steady around the folded program.

For a moment, I looked at that hand.

Then she was blotting my dress with a napkin, and people were turning, and I could not accuse her of anything without becoming the scene everyone remembered.

“Please stop rubbing it.”

“The blue suite,” she said quickly. “There's a wardrobe upstairs. Margaret keeps spare evening things there. I'll send someone with a dress.”

“I know where the suite is.”

“Of course you do.”

I left my bag beside my place card and went upstairs.

The upper corridor was quiet, carpet swallowing my heels. I passed the closed door toward the service wing and glanced at the temporary sign. No access.

Five days earlier, I had received written confirmation that the unfinished electrical work beyond it was isolated. The guest rooms had been assessed separately. I had insisted on that distinction, twice.

Inside the blue suite, I shut the door and stood in front of the mirror.

I looked like a woman who had been smiling too hard.

An attendant knocked with a pale dress. “Ms. Blake said this room.”

“Thank you.”

She offered to help, but I told her I could manage. Self-sufficient. Wonderful at it.

I had laid the replacement dress across a chair and was reaching for the fastening of the stained one when the alarm sounded.

At first, it was simply offensive noise. I stepped back into my shoes, smoothed the wet silk against my legs, and opened the door.

Something bitter caught at the back of my tongue.

Smoke moved along the ceiling.

I took three steps toward the stairs before a thicker surge rolled around the corner. Heat touched my face. Someone shouted below, the words lost beneath the alarm.

I backed into the suite and closed the door.

My phone.

Downstairs. In my bag.

The ridiculous certainty that I should have brought it struck before fear did.

I dragged a towel from the bathroom, pressed it along the gap beneath the door, and went to the window. The sash resisted. I shoved it with both hands until old paint cracked and the window rose.

Cold air hit my wet skin.

“Help!”

People spilled onto the lawn. White shirtfronts, bare shoulders, coats dragged over evening clothes. Somewhere a siren grew louder.

I waved, then realized pale fabric would be easier to see. I pulled the replacement fabric from the chair and thrust it through the opening.

That was when Ethan appeared.

Vivian's arms were around his neck.

For one impossible second, I felt relieved. He was here. He would look for me. All the stupid dinners and the missed dance could wait.

“Ethan!”

He kept walking.

I leaned farther out. The stone beneath my palm scraped skin already hot from the door handle.

“Ethan, I'm here!”

A fire engine stopped beyond the drive. Blue light swept across his face. He turned toward a paramedic.

Toward her.

Smoke thickened behind me. I coughed so hard my knees buckled, and the pale fabric slipped from my hand.

Below, Ethan moved out of sight behind the ambulance.

I couldn't call again.

My fingers lost their hold on the sill.

“There!” someone shouted. “There's someone at the window!”