Chapter 2 - The Silent Permission
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Lucinda did not ask permission to open the gifts. She did not look remotely embarrassed to be doing so while the mother-to-be was scrubbing the floor like a servant.
She aggressively tore through expensive wrapping paper, lifted tiny baby clothes into the air, checked the contents of velvet jewelry boxes, counted the balances on gift cards, and made neat little categorized piles on the table beside her.
"That one can go straight to the nursery at the Wexford house," Lucinda commanded, gesturing to a staff member.
A guest had spent weeks making a beautiful, handmade quilt for Natalie, intricately embroidered with tiny clouds and stars. Lucinda held it up with two fingers, critically examined the stitching, and then tossed it carelessly onto a nearby chair.
"And that piece," she continued without missing a beat, pointing to a silver rattle, "put it with the things for my office. The colors will work beautifully on my display shelf."
My son-in-law, Cole Wexford, stood roughly six feet away with his own champagne glass resting in his hand. He wore a dark, impeccably tailored suit and a practiced smile that had once naively made Natalie think he was a kind, gentle man. He was engaged in an animated conversation with two aggressive investors from Wexford Holdings, actively pretending not to see his heavily pregnant wife struggling on the floor right in front of him.
That specific detail was the part I could never, ever forgive him for.
Lucinda was cruel. Cruelty had become an almost expected character trait from her.
But Cole was entirely silent.
And silence, in that room filled with influential people, was explicit permission.
Natalie finally looked up when she saw me standing frozen in the doorway. For one brief, agonizing second, I saw something raw flash across her face before she quickly lowered her eyes back to the wet carpet.
Shame.
Not anger at her husband. Not relief that I had arrived. Pure, unadulterated shame.
"Mom," she whispered, her voice barely loud enough for me to hear over the upbeat string music. "It is okay. I spilled it. I have to clean it."
No.
May you like
It was absolutely not okay.
That short, pathetic sentence landed deep inside my chest with the hard, final certainty of a heavy deadbolt locking into place.
