Chapter 2 - Flight 604
I did not sleep.
At four in the morning, I showered, changed into jeans and a black sweater, and rode through the Denver darkness toward the airport.
The mountains were invisible.
My marriage felt the same way.
Something enormous had always been there, shaping the horizon, and suddenly I could no longer tell where it ended.
Grant texted while I was going through security.
Morning, superstar. Sleep okay?
I stared at the message.
Then typed:
Barely. Long day yesterday.
He answered with a heart.
I almost laughed.
Instead, I boarded Flight 604.
For three hours I reconstructed the previous year.
Olivia showing up more often.
Grant praising her “eye” for design.
Olivia telling me I worked too much.
Grant saying the hotel project required late meetings.
Thanksgiving, when Olivia and Grant disappeared into the garage for twenty minutes.
Christmas, when Olivia knew exactly which bottle of bourbon Grant wanted without asking me.
One memory after another changed shape.
By the time we landed, my grief had developed an architecture.
There were rooms inside it.
Doors.
Hidden passages.
My father was waiting outside baggage claim.
Robert Bennett had turned sixty-four that spring. After his heart scare two years earlier, he had lost weight and started wearing walking shoes with everything, even slacks.
He looked at my face and said nothing.
He simply opened his arms.
I held on for five seconds.
Then I stepped away.
“Where’s Mom?”
“At your house.”
“With Diane and Tom?”
He nodded.
“Did you tell her anything?”
“No.”
“Good.”
Dad studied me.
“Meredith, whatever we’re walking into, you don’t have to prove anything to us.”
“I’m not bringing you there to prove it to myself.”
He waited.
“I’m bringing you because Grant is very good at rewriting reality.”
Dad’s jaw tightened.
We drove in silence.
At 7:48, we turned onto my street.
Grant’s truck was in the driveway.
Olivia’s car was not.
My stomach dropped.
Maybe I had imagined everything.
Maybe she had stopped by.
Maybe the phone—
Then Dad said, “There.”
A silver Lexus sat two houses down.
Olivia’s.
She had parked away from our house.
My father saw my face.
“Are you sure you want to go in?”
“Yes.”
Mom was waiting beside Grant’s parents near the front walk.
Elaine Bennett looked furious already, though she had no idea at whom.
Diane Carter looked frightened.
Tom looked like he wanted facts.
Good.
Facts were what I had brought them for.
I unlocked the door quietly.
The house smelled like coffee.
And something sweeter.
Olivia’s perfume.
Mom noticed it too.
Her eyes changed.
“Meredith—”
I raised one finger.
From upstairs came laughter.
A woman’s laugh.
My mother’s face drained white.
Diane whispered, “Oh, God.”
We climbed.
No one spoke.
My bedroom door was half open.
The bed was empty.
Olivia’s green-cased phone sat exactly where I had seen it during the call.
Her black boots were beside the dresser.
A red blouse I recognized lay over my vanity chair.
Then we heard water.
And Grant’s voice.
“You’re impossible.”
Olivia laughed.
My father turned away from the bathroom door.
Tom Carter went rigid.
Diane covered her mouth.
I walked forward.
The en suite bathroom door was open three inches.
Steam moved through the gap.
I pushed it wider.
The tub was a large freestanding model Grant had insisted on when we renovated.
I had used it three times.
Grant and Olivia were in it together.
For one strange second, no one moved.
Olivia screamed first.
Grant stood halfway, saw the five of us, and dropped back into the water.
“Meredith—”
I had imagined this moment on the plane.
I imagined screaming.
Slapping him.
Dragging my sister out by her hair.
Instead, I looked at Olivia.
She had my shampoo beside her.
My robe hung within reach.
My sister was bathing in my marriage as if it were another thing she had borrowed.
Mom began crying.
“Olivia.”
Olivia wrapped her arms around herself.
“Mom, please.”
Grant found his voice.
“Mere, this isn’t—”
“Finish that sentence.”
Silence.
He looked at his parents.
At mine.
At me.
“This isn’t what it looks like.”
Dad made a sound behind me that was almost a laugh.
I nodded.
“Good.”
Grant blinked.
“Good?”
“Yes. Because if it’s something more complicated, you can explain it after you put clothes on.”
I turned to Olivia.
“And you can explain why you parked two houses away.”
Her lips parted.
No answer.
I walked back into the bedroom.
The others followed.
Diane was crying now.
Tom looked ten years older.
My mother tried to touch me.
I stepped away.
“Not yet.”
Grant appeared five minutes later wearing sweatpants and a T-shirt.
Olivia wore my robe.
That almost broke me.
“Take it off,” I said.
She froze.
“My robe.”
Her hands shook as she removed it.
She stood there in Grant’s oversized shirt instead.
My mother whispered, “How long?”
Neither answered.
Grant looked at me.
“Mere, can everyone leave?”
“No.”
“This is our marriage.”
“You invited my sister into it.”
His face hardened.
Only slightly.
But I saw it.
Grant did not like losing control of a room.
I had forgotten that.
“Fine,” he said. “I made a terrible mistake.”
Olivia looked at him.
A mistake.
She flinched.
Interesting.
“How long?” I asked.
Grant said, “A few weeks.”
Olivia said, “Seven months.”
They spoke at the same time.
The silence afterward was almost beautiful.
Grant closed his eyes.
I looked at my sister.
“Seven months?”
She started crying.
“I’m sorry.”
“No, you’re scared.”
“Meredith—”
“Sorry comes later.”
Grant stepped toward me.
I stepped back.
“Do not touch me.”
He stopped.
Then his phone rang downstairs.
Once.
Twice.
Three times.
Grant ignored it.
Mine rang next.
The caller ID said First Piedmont Bank.
I looked at Grant.
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His face changed.
And for the first time that morning, I realized the betrayal in my bedroom and the money in his business were about to collide.
