Chapter 13 - The Blessing on the Terrace
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The ballroom grew so quiet that the distant crash of the Atlantic waves against the cliffs outside could be heard through the terrace doors.
Marin stepped forward from behind the wheelchair and stood beside the mahogany lectern where a brushed-steel condenser microphone waited. Under the blazing crystal chandeliers, she looked calm, poised, and utterly unafraid.
Beside the dais, Vivien folded her hands over the skirt of her silver Valentino gown, tilting her chin at the exact angle she had practiced for the society page photographers. Next to her, Senator Morrow puffed out his chest, while Julian Cross leaned casually against a marble pillar with his arms crossed.
Dominic stood two paces to Vivien’s left. He didn't look at his fiancée. His eyes were fixed entirely on Marin and his mother.
"For the past two years," Marin began, her clear, steady voice carrying effortlessly through the ballroom’s high-end acoustic array, "it has been my privilege to care for Mrs. Isabella Varelli, and to assist her in communicating with her family and her physicians after her stroke took her vocal cords."
Vivien nodded encouragingly, whispering beneath her breath through a frozen smile, "Keep it brief, girl. Say the line."
Marin didn't look at Vivien. Instead, she looked down at Isabella Varelli.
Sitting upright in her wheelchair, her system purged of the paralytic glycosides that had weighed down her muscles for a month, Isabella lifted her right hand with startling clarity. She didn't touch the letter board. Instead, she reached out to the small table microphone clipped beside her armrest and rapped her knuckles against the wood three times, loud and sharp enough to echo off every marble wall in the room.
Tap. Tap. Tap.
A murmur of confusion rippled through the front row of guests. Vivien’s smile twitched.
"As Mr. Varelli knows," Marin continued into the microphone, her voice ringing like struck glass, "in this house, two taps mean yes. One tap means no. And three rapid taps mean Enough."
Vivien took a sharp step toward the lectern, her eyes narrowing dangerously as she tried to reach for the microphone stem.
"Marin is clearly overwhelmed by the crowd—" Vivien began loudly.
Dominic stepped smoothly between Vivien and the lectern, catching Vivien’s wrist in a grip of cold iron and holding her cleanly in place beside him.
"Let her finish, darling," Dominic said into his own lapel microphone, his baritone filling the hall. "After all, you told me yesterday at 4:17 PM that my mother had made her feelings about you unmistakably clear. In fact, because you forgot to press the disconnect button on your phone before you dropped it onto my mother’s table, I didn't even need Marin to interpret for me."
Every drop of blood drained from Vivien’s face beneath her stage makeup.
"Dominic, what are you—" Vivien stammered, trying and failing to pull her wrist out of his grasp.
May you like
Dominic raised his left hand toward the upper gallery above the ballroom.
"Play the call, Carlo," Dominic said.
