For three seconds, the reception dissolved into a blur.
Then I smiled.
My sister-in-law’s wedding reception took place in a glass ballroom overlooking the river, the sort of venue where wealth glittered from every polished surface. Champagne towers. String music. Cameras drifting through the crowd like hunters. My mother-in-law, Victoria Hale, stood near the head table dressed in silver silk, one hand settled possessively on the shoulder of the young woman beside her.
Blonde. Laughing. Wearing red to a wedding.
My husband, Daniel, noticed the exact second I noticed her.
His face drained of color.
Victoria’s smile grew sharper. “Oh, Elise, darling. There you are.”
Darling. From her mouth, that word was never affection. It was a blade.
Daniel started toward me, but I looked beyond him at the place cards.
