Will play an intense game of chess with his father, and she leaned over and whispered to her sisters.
“Ever since I told you guys, I feel like I should tell Harley. I hate to be so dishonest with him. Sooner or later, the lie will corrode our relationship,” she said pensively, and both her sisters looked horrified.
“Don’t you dare tell him,” Venetia whispered back. “Harley is much too straightlaced and old school to understand it. You’ll break his heart.”
“What if he leaves you?” Nadia added, frightened for her sister.
“He wouldn’t. He has too big a heart, and he loves Will too much to do that.”
“I don’t think he’d abandon Will, but he might leave you for lying to him. Harley is pretty rigid,” Venetia whispered to Olivia. “You can’t tell him after all this time. And what would you gain from it? What difference does it make now?”
“It’s a matter of integrity,” Olivia insisted.
“You should have thought of that fifteen years ago,” Venetia said, sounding very definite. “Why would you tell him now?”
“After I told you, I realized how wrong it was not to have told him sooner.”
“But you didn’t, so just forget about it now,” Nadia insisted.
“What if he finds out one day after I die? He’d hate me forever,” Olivia said to both of them.
“He’s twenty-one years older than you are. That’s not going to happen,” Venetia said practically.
“It could,” Olivia said. It had weighed on her heavily since the Fourth of July, and she thought about it all the time now. Venetia and Nadia did everything they could to convince her to just put it behind her and forget about it. Her window of opportunity was long past.
* * *
—
It was with genuine regret that they said goodbye when the week ended. Venetia and Olivia and their families flew back to New York together. And late on Sunday afternoon, Nadia drove Sylvie and Laure back to Paris in the rented van that seemed so empty now, without the six cousins talking and laughing, the three sisters chatting, and the two men in earnest conversation about a variety of topics. Ben had liked Harley more than ever, with more time to explore the different facets of him. He could see why Olivia loved him. He was an extremely intelligent, very well-balanced man, with deep knowledge of many fields of interest.
Sylvie and Laure fell asleep on the drive back to the city, and Nadia drove in silence, thinking about how much she loved her sisters and how lucky she was to have them. And she loved both of her brothers-in-law, and Athena’s long-term boyfriend, Joe. The three men couldn’t have been more different, just as she and her sisters were, and their children. They all had distinct personalities and diverse interests. She woke the girls up when she got home, and they helped her carry the bags in, and get them up to the apartment in the elevator. The housekeeper had left food in the refrigerator, but they only wanted a snack for dinner. They ate cheese, cold meats, and fruit they’d brought home from the château.
For the next several days, Nadia had a lot to do to get the girls ready for school. Nicolas had texted her that he wanted to see them and asked when he could come to the apartment. She was grateful for the break they’d taken, being away from each other. Her heart didn’t ache quite so acutely. She had started enjoying life again, after their trip to the States, and her family’s visit to the château.
Nicolas showed up faithfully the next afternoon, after Nadia had chased around with the children all day, doing errands, buying notebooks and school supplies, and new backpacks to put them in. They found pink ones that the girls loved. They showed the backpacks to their father as soon as he walked in, and he assured them they were terrific. Nadia smiled when she saw him with them. Sometimes for an instant she forgot the chasm that had opened between them.
“Did you have fun with your sisters?” he asked Nadia when he saw her.
“Lots. Thank you for the use of the château. They love it there.” She was trying to keep her distance.
“Are you serious about my getting my own apartment?” he asked her when the kids were out of earshot. Pascale had made a big fuss about wanting to live with him, and instead she was going to be with her mother in Brittany for a