“You knew?”

He didn’t answer.

Shelby laughed.

“Of course Eleanor told you.”

I gripped the microphone.

“What are you talking about?”

Shelby looked directly at me.

“My mother was Lydia Monroe.”

“I know.”

“And your father was Charles Blackwell.”

“I know who my father was.”

“So do I.”

The ballroom vanished.

Everything narrowed to Shelby’s face.

“My mother worked for him twenty years ago,” she said. “Before he married Eleanor. They had an affair.”

My heart pounded.

“She told me Charles Blackwell was my father.”

I stared at her.

No.

Shelby was six months older than me.

My parents had married three months before my birth.

It was possible.

Technically.

Horribly.

Possible.

“You became my friend because you thought—”

“I was your sister.”

Seventeen years.

Seventeen years rearranged themselves inside my head.

The coffee outside statistics class.

Our dorm rooms.

Christmas mornings.

Her fascination with family photographs.

Questions about my father.

The way she watched my mother.

“You planned meeting me.”

“Yes.”

“Seventeen years ago?”

“Yes.”

A sound escaped me.

Half laugh.

Half sob.

“And when you met Preston?”

“I hated him at first.”

She looked at her new husband.

Then back at me.

“But eventually I realized something.”

“What?”

“If your family wouldn’t give me what should have been mine, I could take something else.”

Preston stared at her.

“You told me you fell in love with me.”

Shelby didn’t even look at him.

Maybe that was the cruelest moment of his night.

“You were useful.”

The bridegroom flinched.

For the first time, Preston Hale understood what it felt like to be used by Shelby Monroe.

I should have enjoyed it.

I didn’t.

All I could think was:

My sister.

Was Shelby my sister?

Elias approached the stage.

“Open Eleanor’s letter.”

My fingers trembled.

I reached into my handbag.

Removed the cream envelope.

Shelby’s eyes widened.

“What is that?”

I looked at my mother’s handwriting.

Then tore it open.

Inside were three things.

A letter.

A laboratory report.

A small USB drive.

I unfolded the letter.

My darling Vivienne,

The first line nearly broke me.

If Shelby is wearing your ring when you read this, then everything I feared has happened.

My vision blurred.

I kept reading.

First, I am sorry. There are secrets parents keep because they are ashamed, and secrets they keep because they believe silence is protection. Both can hurt their children.

I looked up at Shelby.

She had gone very still.

I continued.

Charles did have an affair with Lydia Monroe before you were born. I discovered it years later. Lydia became pregnant, and Charles believed for a time the child might be his.

A murmur moved through the ballroom.

Shelby whispered:

“He knew.”

I read on.

When Shelby came into your life at Columbia, I recognized Lydia’s name. At first I believed coincidence had brought you together. Later, I learned it had not.

Shelby’s tears were falling now.

Lydia had spent years telling Shelby that the Blackwells had abandoned her. She told her Charles refused to acknowledge his own daughter. She told her half of everything that belonged to you should have belonged to Shelby.

Shelby stepped toward the stage.

“Stop.”

I didn’t.

But Lydia Monroe lied.