Chapter Twenty The Rehearsal Dinner #2
She returned the phone to its hiding place. Made sure everything was exactly as she had found it. Left the room with the calm, measured steps of a woman going about her ordinary business.
Inside, her mind was racing.
Options. She needed options.
She could tell James. Sit him down, explain everything: Viktor, the blackmail, the forged documents, her past, all of it. He would understand. James understood everything, forgave everything.
But then he would know. He would know what she had been. What she was still capable of being. And even if he forgave her, he would never look at her the same way again.
And worse: if she told James, he would want to confront Viktor. James was not built for confrontation with men like Viktor. He was trusting, open, utterly transparent in his emotions. Viktor would see him coming from a mile away.
She could run. Take James and leave tonight, before the wedding, before Viktor could act. Disappear into the world, start over somewhere new.
But Viktor would follow. Viktor always followed. And running meant abandoning everything James was: his family, his friends, his life. She couldn’t ask him to give all that up without telling him why. And she couldn’t tell him why.
She could go to the police. Report the threat, have Viktor arrested.
And say what? That she had broken into his room, found his secret phone, decoded messages that could mean anything?
Viktor would deny everything. Viktor would produce his impeccable documents, his charming smile, his wounded-brother routine.
And then Viktor would know she was onto him, she would lose her edge and James would be dead before anyone could prove anything.
Which left one option.
The option she had been trained for.
She would handle Viktor herself. She would use everything he had taught her against him. She would protect James without James ever knowing he needed protecting.
And when it was over she could decide what he needed to know.
She found a quiet corner and began to plan.
???
The rehearsal dinner proceeded with the brittle perfection of all Elizabeth’s events.
Anastasia sat at the head table, smiling, making conversation, complimenting the food. She watched Viktor across the room, playing the devoted brother, charming Gerald, amusing Granny, fitting seamlessly into the family tableau.
She watched him watching James.
Now that she knew what to look for, she could see it clearly: the constant low-level attention, the calculating assessment, the way Viktor’s eyes tracked James’s movements around the room. Not protective. Predatory.
She wondered what method he had planned. Poison perhaps, Viktor had always favoured poison. Or an accident, something that could be blamed on the chaos of the wedding. She would need to watch the food, the drinks, the routes between venues.
She would need to be everywhere at once.
James appeared beside her, slightly flushed, vibrating with suppressed excitement.
‘I’ve done it,’ he whispered.
‘Done what?’
‘Fixed it. The wedding. I’ve made some calls. Changed some things. Mummy doesn’t know yet, she’s going to be furious, but tomorrow is going to be ours. I promise.’
She looked at him, this sweet, brave, oblivious man who thought the biggest threat to their wedding was an ice sculpture upsetting her.
‘James,’ she said. ‘I love you. Whatever happens tomorrow, I need you to know that.’
‘Of course I know that. Why are you being so intense?’
‘Just... remember that I said it. When the time comes.’
‘When what time comes?’
She kissed him instead of answering. Across the room, Viktor watched them with a blank stare.
Tomorrow, everything would change. Tomorrow, she would save James’s life or die trying.
Tonight, she would let him believe that ice sculptures were the worst of their problems.
???
It was late. The rehearsal dinner had wound down.
The guests had retired. The caterers had packed away the last of Elizabeth’s five-course preview, which had been, Gerald conceded, genuinely excellent, even the thing with the figs.
The house was quiet in the way that large houses are quiet: creaking, settling, the hush of an old stone holding its breath before an event.
Elizabeth was at her dressing table, removing jewellery with the precise, methodical movements she applied to everything. Gerald was in the armchair by the window, the one he always sat in, the one with the reading lamp, a decanter and the view of the lake.
‘Do you think he’ll be happy, Gerald?’
Gerald looked up. Elizabeth was watching him in the mirror, her hands still, her face stripped of its usual composure. It was, the first time in years he had seen her look uncertain.
‘Of course he will. He’s James. He’s always happy.’
‘That’s what worries me.’
Gerald set down his book. ‘Elizabeth.’
‘He gives everything, Gerald. Every time. He gives himself completely to people and he never holds anything back and he doesn’t understand that some people aren’t built to receive that. His father wasn’t.’ She paused. ‘I wasn’t, for a long time. And I’m frightened that she…’
‘She loves him.’
‘Everyone loves him. Loving him is the easy part. Staying is the hard part.’ Elizabeth removed an earring, set it down.
Her hands, Gerald noticed, were not quite steady.
‘Charles loved him. Charles loved him more than anything in the world and he still left. Because loving someone and being able to stay with them are not the same thing.’
Gerald was quiet for a moment. Then he got up from his chair, crossed the room, and put his hands on her shoulders.
‘Elizabeth. I have known you for over twenty years. In that time, you have managed every situation, controlled every outcome and organised every aspect of our lives with a precision that would make military commanders weep. You have done this because you believe that if you hold on tightly enough, nothing bad will happen.’
‘Gerald’
‘But you can’t hold on to this. James is going to marry this woman tomorrow and it is going to be wonderful or it is going to be a disaster, whichever way it falls, it will be his. Not yours. His. And the bravest thing you can do, the only thing you can do is let him have it.’
Elizabeth looked at him in the mirror. For a moment, she looked like someone he had never met; vulnerable, uncertain, frightened. Nothing like his wife, who had built an entire personality around never being those things.
‘I’m not good at letting go,’ she said.
‘No,’ Gerald agreed. ‘You’re absolutely dreadful at it.’
She almost smiled. ‘Thank you for that.’
‘But you’re also the strongest person I’ve ever known. And if anyone can learn to let go of a twenty-five-year-old habit of terrified overprotection, it’s you.’
She reached up and placed her hand over his.
‘Twenty-seven years,’ she said. ‘He’s twenty-seven.’
‘Even worse.’
They sat like that for a while. Not speaking. Not needing to. Two people who had been together long enough to understand that some fears couldn’t be reasoned away, only endured.
Then Elizabeth straightened, replaced her composure like a garment and said: ‘The florist is arriving at six. I want the arrangements checked by seven. And if that ice sculpture is even slightly asymmetrical, I will hold Seb personally responsible.’
‘That’s my girl,’ Gerald said.