“What?”
“You said you thought you were ruining your marriage.”
I looked down.
She smiled sadly.
“Emma, leaving that night was the first thing you did to protect yourself.”
I took a breath.
“I know that now.”
She leaned against me.
“Good.”
Victor wrote to me several months after the legal proceedings concluded.
His letter was brief.
He said he had spent a great deal of time examining his own decisions.
He acknowledged that his reluctance to confront Adrian and Eleanor had allowed the situation to continue.
He said he did not expect forgiveness.
But he wanted me to know that he was grateful I had escaped the immediate pressure surrounding the wedding.
At the bottom, he wrote:
I gave you a thousand dollars because it was all I had with me that night. I wish I had given you the truth much sooner.
I read the sentence several times.
