My mouth dropped open, and in that moment, anything could have come out. Fire. Expletives. A scream. But it all tangled together and clogged my windpipe, preventing a single sound.
It wasn’t until Macalister was gone that my words began working again. I clutched Royce’s arm, squeezing the tuxedo fabric in my fingers. “I don’t know how he figured it out, but I didn’t tell him.”
His voice was cool and indifferent, and it hurt like a fist to the chest. “You sure about that?”
“Yes, Royce. I swear.” I’d told him everything, even the stuff that was hard and made me look awful. “You believe me, right?”
The hesitation in his distant eyes was painful. “Yeah, of course.”
He’d told me he wouldn’t lie when we were alone.
And yet he just had.
Royce and Macalister weren’t back by midnight, and even though I was still in my dress, I went downstairs seeking a late-night snack. Or maybe a drink.
But the kitchen wasn’t empty.
Alice sat alone at the table and in the near-dark, an untouched mug steaming in front of her.
“Marist.” She put her hand over her heart. “You startled me.”
“Sorry, I was hungry.” I bit my lip and inched toward the table. “Are you okay?”
“No.” She didn’t look at me. Her eyes were out the window, staring at the gardens she loved to maintain. “I’m leaving.”
I nearly asked where she was going before her meaning sank in. “You’re leaving Macalister?”
She nodded. “If I’d known it was going to be like this, there’s so much I would have done differently.”
I lowered myself into a chair across from her, feeling like she wanted to talk, even if it was with the girl her husband was fixated on. The lights weren’t on inside the kitchen, but my eyes had adjusted, and there was plenty of light coming in from outside. She looked tired. Weary and maybe broken.
I hurt so badly for her.
“I tried to give him everything he wanted,” she added. “But I couldn’t. I was never going to be her.”
She had to be talking about Macalister’s first wife, Royce and Vance’s mother. She lifted a hand and delicately wiped it under an eye. Was she crying?
“I’m sorry, I don’t know why I’m telling you this. I don’t mean to put it on you.”
I wanted to help, to make her feel better. “No, it’s okay.”
“Do you want some tea?” She gestured to the cup in front of her and then the teapot still on the counter. “I think I made enough for two.”
“Sure.”
Her blue dress swished as she went to the cupboard and pulled down a mug. “I tried to leave him once before, a little over a year ago.” She filled the cup and handed it to me. “We were separated for three months. I think the rumor was I’d been sent to rehab.”
She’d been gone when Royce graduated with his MBA from Harvard. That felt so long ago. “But you came back.”
“I was unhappy no matter where I was, and decided I’d rather be unhappy with him around.”
I took a sip of my tea and made a face at the bitter taste. Normally, I loaded it with sugar and milk, but it seemed rude to get up in the middle of her conversation.
Her eyes were sad as her gaze settled on me. “I’m not proud of it, but for a time I found someone else who made me . . . less unhappy.”
“Vance,” I said.
It didn’t surprise her that I knew. “Yes.” Her fingers traced the handle of her mug. “We both wanted to hurt him in our own way. You’ve seen how hard Macalister can be on his sons.”
“Yeah.” I took another sip of my tea.
“Part of him died when Julia did.” I froze mid-sip, but Alice was very matter of fact about it. “A lot of the good parts, from what I’ve heard.”
“Hmm,” was all I could find to say from under my mug. I didn’t remember him much from before the accident.
“I knew the thing with Vance wasn’t going anywhere. It couldn’t. But Macalister lost interest in me years ago, and Vance was all I had.”
Until Jillian Lambert.
The image flashed through me of Vance’s hips pressed to Jillian’s ass. I drank my tea to try to wash it away.
“I can’t be here anymore, not when no one wants me.”
“That’s not true.”
She looked dubious. “Oh? Don’t tell me you want me around. We’re not friends, Marist.”
“We could be,” I offered. It wasn’t the most convincing I’d ever sounded.
She shook her head then reached behind it and began to pull out the pins in her hair, dropping them onto the table in a neat stack. “No, I really don’t think we could.”
“Why not?”
Her blue eyes were full of turmoil and irritation. “You know why.”
My pulse quickened, but I tried to remain calm and stared at the woodgrain in the table. Was she talking about the initiation? Macalister’s obsession with me? Or had she seen us in the hedge maze the night I’d lost to the Minotaur?