Chapter 2 - The Woman Missing From the Photograph
Celeste reached the photograph first.
Almost.
Adrian caught her wrist.
“What are you doing?”
“I was helping your grandmother.”
“No.”
His voice was quiet.
Something about it made Celeste release her hand immediately.
Eleanor held the photograph against her chest.
Her entire body trembled.
I should have taken Lucia and left.
Every instinct told me to.
We did not belong inside whatever family disaster had just opened beneath those chandeliers.
But Lucia had returned to my side and wrapped one hand around mine.
“Mama, did I dance wrong?”
I crouched.
“No, baby.”
“Then why is everybody sad?”
I had no answer.
Eleanor did.
“Because you danced beautifully.”
She knelt slowly despite her age.
“That movement… who taught you?”
“Mommy.”
“And who taught Mommy?”
“Grandma Rose.”
Eleanor closed her eyes.
A tear slid down her cheek.
Celeste laughed nervously.
“This is ridiculous. Thousands of dances use turns like that.”
The conductor interrupted.
“No.”
Everyone looked at him.
“I studied composition at the New England Conservatory. I know most private Vale works from archival references.”
Adrian’s eyes sharpened.
“Private?”
The conductor nodded toward Eleanor.
“That melody was catalogued but never published.”
I stared.
“My mother played it constantly.”
Eleanor finally turned the photograph around.
Three women stood beside an old grand piano.
A much younger Eleanor.
A teenage brunette.
And another teenage girl whose face had been scratched away.
My stomach tightened.
“Who are they?”
“My daughters.”
Adrian stepped closer.
“My mother, Vivian, is the brunette on the right.”
He pointed toward the damaged figure.
“And this was Rosalind.”
Eleanor’s second daughter.
Missing for thirty-four years.
Officially presumed dead after a fire at a summer arts conservatory in Vermont.
No body had been recovered.
Yet Eleanor had been told investigators found Rosalind’s bracelet in the ashes.
I looked at the photograph again.
Something about the posture.
The tilt of the head.
My mother had stood like that.
“Rose was born in Maine.”
At least, that was what I believed.
Eleanor whispered:
“Rosalind hated her full name.”
“What did people call her?”
Eleanor looked at me.
“Rose.”
The ballroom seemed to tilt.
Celeste stepped forward.
“Adrian, enough. This woman clearly heard family stories somewhere.”
I looked at her.
“I didn’t even know your family existed until tonight.”
“You’re working their gala.”
“I work for the catering company.”
Celeste’s jaw tightened.
Adrian noticed.
“So why are you trying so hard to end this conversation?”
“I’m protecting your family.”
“From what?”
Her answer came too quickly.
“Scammers.”
That word changed Eleanor.
She straightened.
“Emily.”
It was the first time she had used my name.
“How old was your mother when she died?”
“Fifty-one.”
“When?”
“Two years ago.”
“Cause?”
“Cancer.”
Eleanor looked at Adrian.
If Rose had been fifty-one, the age fit.
Then Lucia tugged my sleeve.
“Mama.”
“What?”
“Grandma had that picture.”
I froze.
“What picture?”
Lucia pointed at the photograph.
“The piano one.”
Every face turned toward her.
“You saw it where?”
“In Grandma’s red box.”
My mother had owned a red cedar box.
After her funeral, I had placed it in storage without opening everything inside.
Adrian asked:
“Where is that box now?”
Before I could answer, a phone began ringing.
Celeste’s.
She looked at the screen.
Declined it.
It rang again.
Adrian glanced down.
Something changed in his expression.
“What?”
He took the phone before Celeste could stop him.
The caller ID displayed only one name.
DAD.
Celeste’s father.
Charles Winthrop.
Adrian answered.
“Charles?”
Silence.
Then Adrian slowly looked at me.
His face turned cold.
“What do you mean, ‘get the waitress out before Eleanor sees the photograph’?”
May you like
Nobody in the ballroom moved.
Celeste went completely white.
