Chapter Nineteen
There was a different sort of energy in the air now, a new tightness beneath the usual gloss. Lady Beaumont had only been on the estate for a few hours, yet it already felt as though gravity itself had moved around her.
Conversations hushed when she passed by. Staff straightened their posture, and Margaret’s voice had developed that fragile cheer people use when they’re one polite comment away from crying.
All of the guests sensed it, that invisible change that comes when someone important arrives. The laughter was brighter, the posture straighter, and the smiles just a touch too rehearsed.
The party carried on as though nothing was amiss, but the air had that taut, brittle quality of a string pulled too tight. Even the birds seemed to have turned down their chorus, as if waiting for the next word to drop.
Across the terrace, I spotted Sophie weaving through the family towards her grandmother, who stood near the edge of the garden with an expression that could have frozen a lesser mortal.
Gone were the paint-splattered overalls and bright vintage pieces she usually wore like a personal rebellion against beige wealth. Tonight, she’d traded them for a pale champagne dress that was remarkably restrained by Sophie Beaumont standards.
But when Lady Beaumont saw her, her entire expression lit up.
“My darling girl,” I heard her say, drawing Sophie in with a fond smile. “You look lovely.”
Sophie smiled, a little sheepish. “Trying to blend in for once.”
Her grandmother gave a small, amused hum, looping her hand through Sophie’s arm. “Don’t you dare. You’re the only bit of colour this family’s got.”
The words were light, but there was something in her tone, a kind of pride, maybe even protectiveness, that made me wonder just how much the old woman really saw.
Lucas, notably, was nowhere to be found. He’d been suspiciously absent since morning, likely hiding in his room or down near the vines.
I suspected everyone knew. Or at the very least had heard whispers, about his little escapade borrowing the Lady’s car and driver for a “quick coffee run.”
Cleo and I had spent the last few hours in the office making the necessary last-minute changes to the wedding plans to appease the new requests. The phrase “small adjustments” had lost all meaning somewhere around revision seven.
The office smelled faintly of coffee and panic. Swatches of fabric, floral mock-ups, and half-eaten macarons covered the desk like evidence from an unsolved crime.
And the real kicker? The rehearsal dinner was tonight. Not next week. Not even tomorrow. Tonight.
Every new instruction came with the same calm, lethal phrase, “if it’s not too much trouble.” Which, translated from Beaumont to English, meant drop everything and make it happen before lunch.
Cleo was hunched over her laptop, typing furiously with a determined air.
I was grateful that the main elements, including the caterers, the lighting plan, and the seating chart Margaret had changed twice, had survived Lady Beaumont’s intervention relatively unscathed.
Still, every minor change tended to ripple outward like a small earthquake.
Change the flowers and suddenly the table settings felt wrong.
Move the appetizers by ten minutes and the light for photographs changed.
It was the kind of domino effect that made wedding planners twitch in their sleep and wake up apologising to florists.
And through it all, I kept waiting for someone, anyone, to mention the missing brooch. Every time Margaret walked into the room, I half expected her to launch into a full-scale investigation, complete with accusations and clutching her pearls for dramatic effect.
But nothing. Not a single word.
You’d think that would’ve been a relief, but no. The silence made it worse. Because silence in families like this usually meant one of two things, either no one had noticed yet, or everyone had, and they were politely ignoring it until it could be blamed on the help.
Noah and I had agreed to keep it quiet for now, although the secret was really starting to weigh on me.
My nerves were shot, my coffee had gone cold, and even the lilies on my mood board were starting to look like they were judging me.
The wedding was only three days away, but it already felt like the estate was living on borrowed calm.
“I’m going to check the grounds,” I said, reaching for my tablet pretending it was a completely legitimate task.
Cleo didn’t even look up. “Is that code for ‘please don’t call me for five minutes’?”
“Ten,” I said. “If the Wi-Fi cuts out, consider it divine intervention.”
“Fine,” she sighed. “But please come back soon, I’m drowning here.”
The buzz of the estate faded as I slipped outside, trading the smell of coffee and panic for earth and vine.
I took the path that curved behind the house, the temperature dipping as the shade of the vines took over. The air cooled, carrying a faint, earthy scent, damp soil, crushed leaves and the sweet trace of ripening grapes.
The gravel crunched beneath my shoes, each step echoing just enough to remind me how still it was out here. Even the breeze seemed to hush as it moved through the canopy, whispering against the leaves.
Dappled light filtered through the tangled vines, glinting off the old wire trellis. Somewhere nearby, a fly buzzed lazily before disappearing into the greenery.
Everything felt still.
Until, that is, I heard voices.
“…it’s not that simple,” a woman said, low but clipped.
Emma.
Another voice followed, steadier, a hint of irritation tucked into each word. Ethan.
“It never is,” he replied.
I slowed without meaning to. Their tones weren’t angry exactly, more… urgent. The kind of urgent that suggested there was something to hide.
Emma sounded close to tears. “You promised me, Ethan. Not this week. Not with everyone here.”
“I know what I promised,” he said, his voice lower now. “But I have to do this.”
Emma sighed, a sound somewhere between frustration and defeat. “You just have to hold it together a few more days. Please.”
Ethan said something I couldn’t make out, then: “I don’t think I can.”
Silence stretched for a beat too long.
A bird startled from the vines, and I took a step back instinctively, right onto a bit of gravel. It crunched, loud enough to betray me.
Both of them turned at once.
Both of them froze when they saw me, like kids caught somewhere they shouldn’t be. Ethan recovered first, his trademark charm sliding neatly into place. “Miss Sinclair,” he said, voice smooth but a touch too quick. “Didn’t expect to see you all the way out here.”
I lifted my tablet slightly. “Just checking the cellar doors. Routine stuff.”
Emma blinked, her face too composed to be natural. “Oh, right. We were just… going over our speeches.”
“Of course,” I said, as if that explained why they were tucked away behind the main house, voices low and hunched together quietly. “Always good to rehearse.”
Ethan’s smile came easily, but his eyes didn’t match it. “Timing’s everything, isn’t it?”
“Especially at weddings,” I said lightly.
That earned a short laugh, not quite genuine, but enough to close the gap. Emma tightened her grip on the folder she was holding, fingers white at the edges. “We should get back,” she said quickly.
“Sure,” Ethan said, his tone too casual. He lingered a moment longer, studying me like he wanted to gauge whether I’d actually heard anything. Then, with that same easy grin, he followed her up the path.
What had they been whispering about out here, behind the house where no one was meant to be?
Their voices had carried just enough for me to catch the edges of something. Not words exactly, but the feeling behind them, that low, urgent kind of tone that only comes with guilt, or desperation, or both.
I could still see Emma’s face, pale and set, her arms crossed in a way that suggested something far more explosive than going over some speech notes.
And Ethan, all that charm, the easy grin, but his eyes flicked too fast. The look of a man trying to keep a dozen lies balanced and praying no one sneezed.
The question that lodged itself, annoyingly, was what exactly was he holding together?
I shook my head. It was ridiculous, really. I was seeing suspects everywhere.
But everything at Langston Estate seemed to be tangled together in ways that didn’t make sense.
People avoiding questions. Secrets tucked behind polite smiles. Too many coincidences for comfort.
And I knew that somewhere in all of it, something was waiting to come undone.