Chapter 2 - WHAT ARIEL SAW
The party ended fifteen minutes later under a layer of fake excuses so thin it was insulting.
Clara claimed she’d had “a minor dermatology procedure.”
Glen backed her up too quickly.
Our guests took one look at my face and started gathering presents and diaper bags without asking questions.
By sunset the backyard was empty except for wet towels, a sagging birthday banner, and the silence of people who had left with gossip.
Ariel sat curled in my lap on the living-room sofa, hiccuping the last of her tears.
I pressed a cool washcloth to her cheek.
Glen hovered across from us.
He kept trying to sound calm, but every sentence came out clipped.
“She’s three, Rachel.”
“I know exactly how old my daughter is.”
“She could have misunderstood what she saw.”
I looked at him. “Then tell me what she saw.”
He hesitated for one fraction of a second.
Too long.
“She saw Clara changing. That’s all.”
Ariel lifted her head.
“No.”
Glen went still.
I smoothed my daughter’s hair back from her damp face. “Baby, can you tell Mommy what happened?”
Her tiny fingers twisted in the hem of my shirt.
“I went to find juice,” she whispered.
That tracked. At the party she’d escaped twice already, once toward the driveway and once toward the laundry room.
“And then?” I asked.
“I saw Clara.”
“Where?”
Ariel pointed toward the backyard.
“In the little house.”
The pool house.
My pulse kicked.
“What was Daddy doing?”
Ariel looked at Glen. Then at me.
“He was down here.”
She slid off my lap, dropped to her knees on the rug, and reached both arms toward an invisible person’s waist.
Then she pressed her cheek gently against her own stomach.
My skin went cold.
“Like that?” I asked.
She nodded.
“Daddy kissed it,” she said. “And he said, ‘Don’t let Rachel see.’”
Glen stood up so abruptly the coffee table rattled.
“That is not what I said.”
Ariel startled and shrank back behind my knees.
I shot to my feet.
“Sit down.”
“I’m not going to be accused by a three-year-old who repeats half a sentence and turns it into—”
“Into what?” I snapped. “What exactly could she possibly be turning it into unless there was something to turn?”
He dragged both hands through his dark hair.
“It was a surprise.”
I laughed once.
No humor.
“A surprise?”
He nodded too fast. “Yes.”
“What kind of surprise involves you in the pool house with my stepmother while my child watches you kiss her stomach?”
He opened his mouth again.
Nothing came out.
That silence said more than any confession could have.
Ariel began crying again and buried her face in my leg.
I picked her up and held her tight.
Glen stared at us both.
Then he said the one thing that made the night worse.
“Rachel, you need to trust me for one day.”
I looked at the man I had married.
Then at my daughter’s red cheek.
Then back at him.
“After today,” I said, “I don’t trust you for one minute.”
He swallowed hard.
Then his phone buzzed on the counter.
May you like
He glanced at the screen.
And turned it facedown so fast I didn’t even need to ask who it was from.
