Anton turned back.
“No one’s waving.”
“Oh.” I smiled. “Must have been someone behind you.”
Carmela looked at my hand.
At the glass.
Her expression relaxed.
She thought I was still holding mine.
The entire ballroom rose.
“Cheers!”
Crystal glasses lifted beneath the chandeliers.
I turned toward Carmela.
“To our new family,” I said.
She smiled triumphantly.
“To family.”
I took a long drink from the safe glass.
And watched her.
Carmela raised the champagne she had poisoned.
She drank.
Not a polite sip.
Almost the entire glass.
For several seconds, nothing happened.
My heartbeat sounded louder than the orchestra.
Then Carmela blinked.
Once.
Twice.
Her fingers tightened around the stem.
Anton leaned toward her.
“Mom?”
“I’m fine.”
But she wasn’t.
A strange redness had begun creeping up her neck.
Her eyes looked unfocused.
She reached for her handbag.
“Maybe the champagne is stronger than I expected.”
When she stood, the bag slipped from her lap.
It hit the marble floor.
Lipstick rolled underneath the table.
A compact mirror cracked.
A set of keys scattered beside Anton’s shoe.
And then—
a tiny dark bottle rolled into the open.
My breath stopped.
Bianca’s phone immediately lifted across the ballroom.
Carmela saw the bottle.
Her face changed.
She bent down too quickly.
“I’ll get that.”
But Anton picked it up first.
“What is this?”
“Give it to me.”
“Mom, what is it?”
“I said give it to me!”
Several nearby guests turned.
The photographer lowered his camera.
Even the music seemed quieter.
Anton stared at the bottle.
Then at his mother.
Then at me.
Carmela suddenly grabbed the edge of the table to steady herself.
“Clara,” she whispered.
For the first time that entire day, she looked afraid.
But then something unexpected happened.
She smiled.
A thin, vicious smile.
“You switched the glasses.”
My blood ran cold.
Anton looked between us.
“What does that mean?”
Carmela pointed at me.
“She knew.”
Murmurs spread through the head table.
And suddenly I understood what she was doing.
She was going to turn this around.
Make herself the victim.
Make everyone believe I had deliberately drugged her.
Carmela raised her voice.
“She gave me that drink!”
Gasps erupted around us.
Anton stepped away from me.
“Clara?”
That hurt more than I expected.
I could already see guests whispering.
Phones rising.
Cameras turning toward me.
Carmela’s confidence returned.
“Call security,” she demanded. “Before this woman destroys my son’s life.”
Two hotel security officers began walking toward our table.
Carmela straightened despite her shaking legs.
She thought she had trapped me.
She thought my silence meant panic.
She thought the bride from the “wrong family” was about to be dragged out of her own luxury wedding in front of three hundred guests.
I slowly reached for my phone.
Bianca stood across the ballroom.
Our eyes met.
She nodded.
Because Carmela had forgotten one thing.
I had recorded what happened before the toast.
And Bianca had recorded everything after.
I unlocked my phone, walked toward the enormous LED screen behind the wedding stage, and handed it to the stunned technician.
“Connect this,” I said.
Anton stared at me.
Carmela’s face went white.
The screen behind us flickered.
Three hundred guests turned toward it.
And the first frozen frame appeared—
Doña Carmela holding my champagne glass in one hand… and that tiny dark bottle in the other.