throughout the crowd that has gathered around us. I can tell at once that she is going to behave like I actually hit her, making me wonder why I didn’t just go ahead and do it. Somehow, through the red haze fogging my vision, I realize hitting her would prove her point.
She flinches again as I throw my hand around her shoulder and pretend to hug her, while dropping my mouth to her ear.
“You know nothing, Ginny,” I whisper coldly. “You have girlish dreams of what life in my house is like. But your dad didn’t scream at you every day of your life. You didn’t have to watch yours get drunk, wondering how long it would be before he went after your every flaw, real or imagined. And you didn’t have to sit in a hospital, waiting for them to come out and tell you that your drunk father killed your mother.”
She pulls back. I expect her to be cowed, to look sheepish, but she doesn’t. It’s the sorrow in her eyes that catches me off guard, making me feel the size of a pea. “I’m sorry that happened to you. And I’m sorry you’re so angry—”
“But I’m ruining your perfect wedding, right?”
“What would your mother say right now?”
The weight of a boulder lands on my chest. What am I supposed to say to that? I hate her. That’s what I want to say. How dare she use my mother against me? She barely knew her, never got to see all the pain my father caused her. She thinks a few wedding planning sessions gave her deep insight? It barely gave her a glimpse. A few hours into being a MacLaine, and she’s already an expert. And that’s just it. I don’t know why I worried about Ginny joining the family. She fits in better than I ever will.
“She’d tell you to make the best of your life. To take your advantage of wealth, your family connections, and make a good life from it. She wouldn’t want you to be so full of rage. Because she would see what I see—that the anger is hurting you most of all.”
Her words are sharp and pointed, delivering a precise prick that deflates me like a carefully popped balloon. She’s right, isn’t she? I can say she didn’t know my mother well enough, but that’s exactly the kind of thing my mother was always telling me.
Maybe I’m so accustomed to expecting the worst that I’m seeing it now. I’m ready to forgive Ginny—admit that I’m wrong—until she adds, “Instead, you’re going to burn it all down. Fight with everyone, every chance you get. You’re just like your father, actually. No compromises. No consideration. You don’t even realize you’re lashing out. I mean, for Christ’s sake, Adair, you’re dating some piece of trash orphan who’s only out for our money!”
Her words sting, and I recoil, stepping back from her.
That’s what this is about. It was coordinated. She is a MacLaine. Even today, my family can’t relax and celebrate. They have to plot and manipulate and control. She planned this with my father. How else could she know about Sterling’s past? My father is having the opposite version of this conversation with Sterling, right now. I know it. Did they plan it, or is Ginny so perfect for my family that she didn’t have to be told? Is this a role she has chosen, or the one she was born to play?
I don’t even realize my palm is swinging toward her face until my eyes lock with her panicked ones. It’s too late to stop it. I might as well enjoy it. She deserves it. She made her wedding a battle zone. She deserves a little friendly fire.
“Kindly do not hit my wife,” Malcolm says, catching my arm an inch from her perfectly made up face.
Ginny collapses into him, blubbering and teary, a jumbled mixture of what I said and a lot that I didn’t spilling out of her mouth. I see her eyes peek up at him through wet lashes, trying to gauge his reaction so she can calibrate her performance. So he will remember me as a monster who tried to take her perfect day from her, instead of what really happened. Somewhere in her babbling I hear her mention my mother again.
“Don’t ever talk to me about my mother again,” I snarl, gathering up the hem of my dress, kicking off my heels, and running through the doors.