“You want the truth? Fine. Daniel came to me because he was worried about you. He said you were spiraling. He said you were paranoid about money.”
I stared at her.
“He came to you?”
Courtney’s chin lifted.
“Yes.”
“When?”
She hesitated.
And that hesitation told me the answer before she did.
I felt my stomach drop.
“Before the divorce,” I said.
Courtney said nothing.
The dining room seemed to tilt.
My mother looked away.
I turned to her.
“You knew.”
Patricia’s mouth tightened.
“Daniel was trying to manage an impossible situation.”
“How long?”
Courtney rolled her eyes.
“Don’t be pathetic.”
“How long?”
My voice cracked across the room like a whip.
Courtney flinched.
For once, everyone saw it.
She recovered fast, but not fast enough.
“It wasn’t like that,” she said.
Thomas Vail muttered, “Good Lord.”
Rebecca closed her eyes for half a second, like even she needed patience.
I looked at my sister. My beautiful, polished, cruel younger sister who had spent our childhood taking my clothes, my friends, my achievements, and somehow convincing our mother that I was selfish for noticing.
“You slept with my husband.”
Courtney’s face hardened.
“He was leaving you anyway.”
There it was.
The final little blade.