Chapter 6
Story: She Walked Into Her Son's Wedding Bald, Then the Bride Pointed at an Empty Chair
They came back at nine o'clock with nothing.
Fen saw the car pull into the parking lot, saw the headlights sweep across the dark windows of the ballroom, and saw Nathaniel step out first, then Petra, then the officer. The three of them walked through the double doors and into the low hum of the stalled reception, and the room went quiet again, the way it had gone quiet when Rosalind first walked in.
Nathaniel's face was gray. He walked to the head table and stood behind his chair, not sitting, not speaking. Petra stood beside him, her arms crossed, her eyes scanning the room.
The officer walked over to Rosalind.
"Ma'am," she said, "I need to update you."
Rosalind looked up. She had been sitting with Fen at the back table for over an hour, her clutch closed on her lap, the note folded back inside it. She had not touched the champagne in front of her.
"The bride's key was in her jewelry box, as she said. It was not the key you gave her. It's a different key — an older one, with a different cut." The officer paused. "It does not fit the lock on your house."
Petra's voice cut across the room. "I told you. I never used the key. I lost it a year ago. The one I have is a spare I got made."
"Who got it made?"
"I don't remember. A locksmith. Somewhere."
The officer turned back to Rosalind. "We've verified her phone records for the morning in question. There's no GPS movement that places her at your residence. Her car was parked at her apartment all night."
Fen looked at Petra. The bride was standing with her arms crossed, her chin lifted, her smile back in place, a smile that was now triumphant.
"I told you," Petra said. "I never stepped foot in that house. I don't know what happened to your dress or your jewelry, but it wasn't me. You made a scene at my wedding over a note you wrote to yourself, and you have nothing."
"It isn't my handwriting," Rosalind said.
"Then it's a lie. You wrote it. You shaved your head. You cut up your own dress and hid your own jewelry and wrote a note to yourself so you could play the victim at your son's wedding."
"The bed was undisturbed," Rosalind said. "When I woke up, the bed on my side was smooth. The covers had not been slept in. I slept in the blue room, but the bed was untouched."
The room went silent.
Petra blinked. "What?"
"I fell asleep on the couch," Rosalind said. "I read in the living room, and I fell asleep there. I don't remember when, I just remember waking up at midnight to go upstairs. I got to the blue room, and I was too tired to sleep in the bed, so I lay down on top of the covers. I woke up at five, and I went to lie down on the bed properly—" She stopped. "And the bed was cold. The sheets were cold. And my dress was on the floor in pieces."
"Your point?" Petra said.
"My point, Petra, is that the police will find the jewelry. They will find the car. And when they find those things, they will also find that the note was written by someone who has never been near the blue room before."
Fen's phone vibrated. She looked down. A message from a number she didn't recognize.
She read it, and her face changed.
"Rosalind," she said.
Rosalind turned.
Fen held out her phone. The screen showed a text, short and cold.
*Take down the video, or your daughter finds out where her tuition money actually went.*
Fen read it again. Then she read it a third time. The blood had drained from her face. She looked at Rosalind, and her hand was shaking, the phone trembling in her fingers.
"I have to delete it," she said. "I have to delete the video."
"Fen—"
"She knows. She knows I recorded it. She knows what's on it. She's threatening my daughter." Fen's voice was a whisper, quick and panicked, nothing like the quiet woman who had stood at the back of the ballroom all night. "I can't—I have to delete it. I have to."
Petra was watching them from the head table, a small smile on her lips.
Fen's thumb hovered over the screen. The video. The recording. The chair crashing, the champagne spilling, the note held up—she had it. She had everything, and Petra had nothing, and now Petra was taking it away with a single text.
"I'm sorry," Fen said. "I'm so sorry."
She pressed delete.
The screen flashed. The video was gone.
In the far corner of the ballroom, the empty chair against the far wall seemed to grow larger, more solid, the single seat pushing its way into the room's attention. No one was sitting in it. No one seemed to know why it was there. But it was there, and it was waiting.
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