The Ticket Was Never for His Mistress Chapter 03

The Ticket Was Never for His Mistress Chapter 03

Two weeks later, I had two appointments on the same morning.

My first ultrasound at nine.

My mother’s grave at noon.

It had been three years since the cancer took her. Grant had held me at her funeral and whispered, “I’ll be your family now. I promise.”

I called him at eight.

Seven rings. Then wind. Laughter. Water lapping.

“Hazel? What is it?” Irritated. Like I’d interrupted something sacred.

“Where are you?”

“Tahoe. Brooke’s been having panic attacks. I thought the lake would help.”

In the background: “Grant! Come look, there’s an eagle!”

“Coming, babe,” he called. Soft. Tender.

Babe.

“Today is my mother’s anniversary,” I said.

Silence. Just a few seconds.

“God. Hazel, I’m sorry. I’ll have Walter send white roses. Tell her I’m sorry. Next year, I promise, I’ll be there.”

“My mother doesn’t want your roses, Grant.”

I hung up before I could say the rest.

And I have something to tell you. Something that would have changed everything.

The ultrasound room was cold.

“Just you today?” the technician asked, glancing at the empty chair.

“Just me.”

She moved the wand. And then the room filled with it.

A heartbeat. Fast. Fierce. Like tiny galloping hooves.

“Strong little one,” she smiled. “Eight weeks.”

I pressed my hand over my mouth. I’d imagined this moment a hundred times. Grant beside me, crushing my hand, crying.

Instead I cried alone, and the technician handed me a tissue and pretended not to see.

She printed the picture. A little gray bean.

I put it in my coat pocket, over my heart.

At the cemetery, rain started.

I knelt in front of my mother’s stone and wiped the mud from her name. Margaret Quinn. Beloved.

“Mom,” I whispered. “You’re going to be a grandma.”

The wind moved through the cypress trees.

“You told me not to marry him. You said a man who needs you too much will one day resent you for it.”

I laughed through tears. “You were right. You were always right.”

I placed the ultrasound photo against her stone for a moment, like I was showing her.

“I’m leaving. I’m not going to become the woman who waits by the door.”

When I got home, the kitchen lights were on.

Grant was there. Shaved. Crisp white shirt. A bouquet of red roses on the counter.

The whole house smelled of my mother’s lasagna. Her recipe. The one I’d taught him in our first apartment.

“You’re soaked.” He took my coat, frowning. For one second, he sounded like my husband again.

Then I saw it. On his wrist. A thin rose-gold bracelet. Engraved. B.

“Tonight’s the last night,” he said, eyes pleading. “One final dinner with her. Then she flies out Friday, and it’s you and me. I swear.”

I looked at the roses. Dark red. Like old blood.

“Grant. One last request.”

“Anything.”

“Dance with me. Our wedding song. Right here. One song.”

The first dance at our wedding, he’d stepped on my dress four times and I’d laughed so hard I cried. Every anniversary since, he’d pulled me into the kitchen and danced with me to Etta James, barefoot, laughing.

Until this year.

He looked at his watch.

“Hazel… she’s already waiting. Next time. I promise.”

He kissed the air near my forehead. I turned my face away.

The door closed. The engine faded.

I played “At Last” on the kitchen speaker.

And I danced. Alone. Barefoot on the cold tile. Arms around nothing.

I danced for the boy in the garage. For the girl who sold her mother’s house. For seven years of loving someone more than he loved me.

When the song ended, I was on my knees. Smiling.

It was over.

At 1:07 a.m., my phone lit up. A video from Brooke.

Grant on her couch, shirt half unbuttoned, her hand sliding over his chest.

“He’s staying tonight.”

I didn’t finish watching it.

At 3 a.m. I left a white envelope on his pillow.

At 4 a.m. I snapped my SIM card in half at the airport and dropped it in the trash.

At 5:40 a.m. my plane lifted off.

Grant would come home to an empty house.

And a letter that would destroy him.