Chapter 1

At the Thanksgiving engagement party, Nathan Hall built the stage with his own hands.

He told me it was a surprise for me.

But when the moment came, the person he led up there wasn't me.

It was Joanna Reed, the student he had been sponsoring for five years.

Joanna was wearing the white dress I had made, and holding the bouquet I had picked.

Nathan said to the whole room, "Joanna has been through too much. Tonight I want to give her a place in this family first."

Somebody in the crowd called out that Mr. Hall really had a heart.

I sat there and slowly tore my invitation in half.

The host tried to save it. "And our bride to be."

I stood up and took the microphone, smiling.

"The bride to be is dead. All of you made her sick enough to die."

*****

Nathan's face changed.

I turned to the hotel manager.

I said, "Take the stage down. Send the bill to the Hall Family. My money doesn't build nests for strays."

The whole hall went as quiet as if somebody had a hand around its throat.

Silver white gauze hung around the stage, the light strings were shaped into a ring, and two glass lanterns stood beside it. I chose every piece of it myself.

Nathan said a Thanksgiving engagement would feel like a real ceremony, and he wanted me to remember it for the rest of my life.

I did remember it.

I remembered him spending my money, building my stage, and letting another woman wear my dress, hold my bouquet, and stand where I was supposed to stand.

The hotel manager froze, looking between Nathan and me, not daring to move.

I slapped the half invitation down on the table. "Are you deaf? Take it down."

The manager came back to himself and waved his staff over.

A few staff in black uniforms started toward the stage, and Nathan came down off it with a dark face.

He said, "Vivian, that's enough."

He kept his voice low, as if he were still holding on to some scrap of dignity.

I looked at him. "When you sat me down there to watch you hand another woman a place in your family, why wasn't that enough?"

Joanna stood on the stage with a white face, and the bouquet in her hand was crushed out of shape.

Her eyes went red fast, as if somebody were holding a knife to her throat to make her stand there.

She said, "Vivian, don't blame Nathan. This is my fault. I just don't have any family for Thanksgiving, and he wanted tonight to hurt a little less for me."

Nathan looked back at her, and his brows pulled together.

That flash of tenderness sat right out in the open on his face, in case anybody missed it.

I laughed, "You have no family, so you take my engagement? What's next? If you have no grave, do I clear you a plot?"

Somebody in the room pulled in a breath.

Nathan's mother, Grace Hall, was the first one who couldn't sit still, and she stood up with an ugly look on her face.

"Vivian, what kind of young woman talks like that? Joanna has had a hard life and lost her parents young. Nathan has looked after her for years. Tonight he's only giving her a little dignity. Can't you make room for that?"

I turned to her.

"Grace, your son walked another woman onto my engagement stage, and you want me to make room. If you're that generous, why not adopt her and write her into the will?"

The color dropped out of Grace's face and then rushed back.

Nathan crossed to me in three strides and reached for the microphone in my hand.

I turned aside.

His hand closed on air, and his face got darker.

He said, "Tonight matters to both families. Do you have to leave every person here with nowhere to stand?"

I brought my hand up and slapped him.

The crack went through the hall, and everything stopped.

His face turned half an inch, and his mouth tightened. He had been carried his whole life and rarely heard a hard word, so that was probably the first time anybody had slapped him in front of a crowd.

I shook out my wrist.

I sneered, "Your hide is thicker than I thought. My hand hurts."

Low gasps went through the guest tables.

Some people filmed it, and others shrank back so they wouldn't get pulled in.

Joanna finally ran down from the stage and put herself in front of Nathan, with tears hanging on her lashes.

She cried, "Vivian, hit me instead. Don't hit Nathan. He only felt sorry for me and wanted me to have something to hold on to at Thanksgiving."

I looked down at her.

The white dress fit her closely, with beading on the shoulders and a small gold clasp at the waist. I had the designer add that clasp because a Thanksgiving engagement should carry a little gold on the dress.

That gold was sitting at her waist.

It was disgusting.

I reached out and took hold of the clasp.

Joanna backed away in fright, but I had her hem, and she stumbled.

Nathan clamped a hand around my wrist. "Vivian Young!"

I pushed him off and pulled the bouquet out of Joanna's hands.

I said, "My dress, my bouquet, a stage my money paid for. You use all of it to play the tragic couple, and you want me to applaud?"

I tossed the bouquet to my assistant. "Put it away. Have the florist price the damage and send the bill to Nathan Hall."

The color left Joanna's face completely.

She whispered, "This dress. Nathan said it was for me."

I looked at Nathan. "Very generous. Handing out my things as gifts. A man with nothing in his pockets would still know how to run a holiday better than you."

A vein jumped at Nathan's temple.

He held his anger down and told the manager, "Nobody touches anything. The Hall Family will cover every cost tonight."

I almost laughed.