After Seven Empty Chairs, I Took My Daughter and Left Chapter 05

After Seven Empty Chairs, I Took My Daughter and Left Chapter 05

The doctor coughed awkwardly, as if fleeing a radiation zone, and quickly left the ward, closing the door behind him.

Only Noah and I remained. The air seemed to solidify.

“Ava,” Noah said, a hint of barely perceptible panic in his voice as he tried to explain. “What did you mean just now? The doctor will get the wrong idea.”

I didn’t look at him. I only lowered my head to look at my wrist, encased in plaster, and spoke in a flat, factual tone.

“I told him you left me. At the hospital.”

The double meaning made him relax. He thought I was only complaining about his “brief departure” that day.

“Listen, I’m sorry.” He came over, lowering his voice. “I’ve been busy with a venture capital project lately. The pressure’s been intense, so I couldn’t stay with you the whole time.”

Another lie. I watched him fabricate excuses without a change in his expression, just as he had touched my cheek with the same hand he used to put that bracelet on Sloane.

I turned my head away.

“If you’re so busy, you don’t have to come,” I said. “I can manage on my own.”

“You’re angry.” He stated his conclusion and immediately pulled out his phone. “This is my fault. Should I have my assistant send over Harry Winston’s newest collection? Or those bags you liked on Newbury Street? I’ll buy them all for you, all right?”

Those expensive symbols of Boston’s upper crust stirred nothing in me. For three years, he had always been like this. Every anniversary, every apology after he knew he was in the wrong, came in the form of luxury goods stamped with logos. They filled the dressing room of our Beacon Hill mansion like a cold, soulless warehouse.

I used to think this was his way of caring. Now I understood he simply couldn’t be bothered to put in any real thought. If it was expensive enough, it couldn’t be wrong.

“I don’t need any of it,” I interrupted. “And don’t send me these things anymore. You don’t need to go to so much trouble.”

It was the first time Noah had heard me speak in such a completely distant tone, and the panic in his eyes deepened.

“You’re my wife. Buying gifts for you is only natural. How could it be trouble?”

Yes. Wife.

How ridiculous, Noah. You don’t even know our divorce papers have been sitting quietly in a lawyer’s office for a week.

In the days after I was discharged, Noah must have wanted to make it up to me. He barely went to the office and stayed home all day.

I used the time to slowly pack my things.

Lily’s old clothes she had outgrown and the stuffed animals she no longer played with. The cuff links I had bought for him that he had never worn. The one photograph of us in the study. Every object that had witnessed the false prosperity of this marriage was placed into boxes, one by one.

Noah saw the piles of boxes in the living room and walked over in surprise.

“Ava, what are you doing?”

Just as he reached for one, his phone rang.

The name flashing on the screen was “Sloane.”

In an instant, Noah forgot everything else. He took the phone and walked quickly toward the balcony, his voice carrying a familiar, careful tension.

“What’s wrong? Don’t cry. Tell me slowly…”

I watched his back and quietly sealed the last box with tape.

Then I used my phone to schedule a pickup from the Boston Children’s Charity Association.

These things were less shared memories than a record of Lily’s growth. Donating them to children who needed them more was the best farewell.

After everything had been taken away, the apartment looked frighteningly empty.

Just then, my phone rang. It was Noah’s private assistant, Ben. He was usually calm and capable, but now his voice was full of barely suppressed urgency.

“Miss Ava! Please come to the Charles River Yacht Club right away. Something’s happened to Mr. Whitaker!”

My heart sank. The yacht club?

I immediately thought of the high-risk sailing races Boston’s rich kids held there, where every year someone was injured because of a mistake. Noah had gone to find Sloane. How had he ended up at a place like that?

I grabbed my coat, called a car, and rushed to the banks of the Charles as fast as I could.

When I arrived, a small crowd had already gathered on the dock. The atmosphere was tense.

Noah stood in the center of the crowd in his tasteful Loro Piana casual wear, looking utterly out of place among people dressed in professional sailing gear.

Across from him stood a man in a black leather jacket, his arms covered in tattoos. He looked Noah up and down with contempt, as if he were staring at an office drone trespassing on his territory.

I recognized the man. Zack. An obscure band drummer, and Sloane’s ex-boyfriend from college.

I had heard of him. Wild, impulsive, obsessed with danger. After their breakup, he had harassed Sloane from time to time.

At that moment, Sloane was standing beside Zack with reddened eyes, looking like a frightened rabbit, as if she were a trophy being fought over by two men.

When she saw me, a flash of smug provocation crossed her eyes.

Zack said to Noah in a rough voice, “Whitaker, you think money can buy everything? Sloane doesn’t like stiff, boring trust-fund boys like you. What she needs is passion and danger.”

He threw a brand-new set of sailing gear at Noah’s feet and jerked his chin toward the two single-handed sailboats waiting on the river.

“If you love her so much, do you dare race me? From here to the Longfellow Bridge and back.”

Noah’s face was livid. He didn’t even know the basics of sailing.

Zack seemed to see his hesitation. He gave a derisive laugh and slung an arm around Sloane’s shoulders.

“If you don’t have the guts, then forget it. Go back to your Financial District. You’ll never understand Sloane’s world.”

Noah’s fists clenched instantly. Wounded pride reddened his eyes.

“I’ll race.”

He almost forced the words between his teeth.

Zack smiled, a wild, triumphant grin. He leaned toward Noah’s ear, speaking low enough that only the two of them could hear, yet with a pressure everyone around them could feel.

“Good. The loser never shows his face in Sloane’s life again.”