The truth became impossible to keep pretending away at the rehearsal dinner.
I’d stepped into the restroom off the private dining room, and from inside the last stall, I heard Camille laughing with two of her bridesmaids just outside.
One of them joked that at least I was footing the entire bill for the wedding.
Camille laughed harder than the joke deserved.
“There are a hundred and twenty million reasons to tolerate her,” she said.
A hundred and twenty million reasons to tolerate her.
Then, quieter, meant only for the two of them: once the money actually landed, everything would change. According to her, Miles had already agreed — privately, apparently, without telling me — that they needed real distance from Castlewood. From this house. From me.
I should have walked straight out of that stall and confronted all three of them on the spot.
Instead, I told myself I’d wait until after the honeymoon, when things were calmer, when I could raise it without looking like exactly the kind of controlling mother-in-law Camille clearly already believed me to be.
By morning, that single night of hesitation had become its own punishment.
After finding the note, I called Miles.
