“Final fitting,” she announced.

She unzipped the enormous white garment bag.

Then she stopped.

Her face changed.

“Mara?”

She said nothing.

I walked toward her.

And saw the dress hanging inside.

For several seconds, my brain refused to understand what my eyes were seeing.

It was ivory.

It was long.

It was technically a wedding gown.

But it was not mine.

Cheap satin reflected harshly beneath the lights.

Oversized rhinestones covered the bodice.

The sleeves hung unevenly.

The neckline was crooked.

The fabric looked like something selected from a costume warehouse at three in the morning.

I touched it.

“What is this?”

Mara looked sick.

“I don’t know.”

“Where’s my dress?”

“The Laurent gown was here last night.”

“Are you certain?”

“I personally checked it after security delivered it.”

My stomach tightened.

Before either of us could say another word, the suite door opened.

My mother walked inside.

She wore cream trousers, a cashmere sweater and an expression of carefully measured concern.

“Oh,” she said.

Her eyes moved toward the dress.

“That’s unfortunate.”

There was something about the word.

Not shocked.

Not horrified.

Not confused.

Amused.

My mother was smiling.

Very slightly.

“What happened to my dress?”

I asked.

She tilted her head.

“Maybe the designer made a mistake.”

Mara immediately stepped forward.

“Madame Laurent does not make mistakes like this.”

My mother ignored her.

“You should calm down, Claire.”

“I am calm.”

“You don’t look calm.”

“I asked where my dress is.”

She sighed.

That sigh had followed me throughout childhood.

When I wanted explanations.

When I protested something unfair.

When I refused to apologize to Vanessa for things Vanessa had done.

“You always become dramatic when something doesn’t go perfectly,” she said.

Before I could answer, my phone vibrated.

Unknown number.

One photograph.

I opened it.

And the room seemed to tilt.

Vanessa stood in front of a mirror somewhere inside the estate, holding my wedding gown against her body.

My gown.

Or at least what looked exactly like it.

The crystal corset.

The embroidered sleeves.

The enormous train.

Beneath the image were six words.

SHE PLANS TO WEAR IT TONIGHT.

My hand went cold.

Mara saw my expression.

“What is it?”

I showed her.

She covered her mouth.

My mother looked over my shoulder.

For half a second, something passed across her face.

Not surprise.

Calculation.

Then it disappeared.

“Well,” she said, “perhaps Vanessa is only joking.”

I turned toward her.

“Where is she?”

“I have no idea.”

“You walked in here thirty seconds after I discovered my dress was missing.”

“That doesn’t make me responsible.”

“I didn’t say it did.”

Her eyes sharpened.

I had learned long ago that the quickest way to make my mother nervous was to remain calm.

Then she smiled.

“You have always been suspicious of your sister.”

“That’s because she once forged my signature to withdraw twenty thousand dollars from a college account.”

“She was nineteen.”

“She was twenty-four.”

“Claire.”

“And she kissed my boyfriend at my twenty-first birthday party.”

“You weren’t serious about him.”

“And she destroyed my graduate school acceptance letter because she didn’t get into the same program.”

My mother’s face hardened.

“Families forgive.”

“No.

Families apologize.

Then forgiveness becomes possible.”

Her lips thinned.

That was when I stopped arguing.