The moment my husband leaned close and whispered, “Try not to embarrass me tonight,” I should have told him to go to hell. Instead, I smiled. That was my first mistake.
We were sitting in his black Mercedes outside a gated estate in Alexandria, Virginia, waiting for a valet kid who looked young enough to need permission to shave. Rain tapped softly against the windshield. My right knee was throbbing from the drive up from Fayetteville, and the damp weather was not helping.
Eric adjusted his tie in the mirror for the third time. “You okay?” he asked, but not in the way people ask when they actually care. “In what sense?”
“You just seem…” He glanced at my knee brace peeking beneath the hem of my navy dress.
“Tense.”
“I’m forty-three with Army mileage and bad cartilage. Tense is my factory setting now.”
He sighed through his nose. “Dana, tonight matters.”
I looked out at the mansion glowing gold against the dark sky.
Big white columns. Too many windows. One of those places where every room probably smelled faintly like expensive candles and old money.
“Pretty sure it matters more to you than me.”
“That’s not fair.”
I turned slowly toward him. “You told me not to embarrass you before we even got out of the car.”
Eric rubbed his forehead like I was already exhausting him. “These are important people.”
“There it is again.”
“What?”
“Important people.” I gave a small shrug.
“Always interesting hearing who counts.”
He stared at me for a second, then shook his head. “You know what I mean.”
“No,” I said quietly. “I know exactly what you mean.”
The valet finally opened my door.
Cold air hit my face. My knee barked the second I stood up. Eric immediately lowered his voice.
“Please don’t mention your surgeries tonight.”
I blinked at him. “My surgeries?”
“People don’t want depressing dinner conversation.”
I almost laughed. Instead, I grabbed my cane from the back seat.
That embarrassed him more than anything I could have said. Inside, the house looked exactly how rich defense contractors think rich people should live. Marble floors, oil paintings, crystal chandeliers the size of fishing boats, a string quartet playing near the staircase while waiters floated around carrying tiny crab cakes on silver trays.
Everybody was talking too loudly. That kind of fake loud people use when they are trying to sound successful. Eric transformed almost immediately.
What happened next changed everything… continues on the next page.
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