Chapter 1 - The Tray in My Hands
My name is Nora Whitfield, and I was twenty-six years old the night I carried a silver tray into the middle of a wedding that was never supposed to happen.
I worked for Bellamy & Hart Events, and that Saturday I was assigned to the Vandermeer–Sinclair reception at the Fairhaven Grand Ballroom.
The room was the kind of place you see in magazines and assume is fake.
Crystal chandeliers hung from a ceiling so high they looked like they were floating, and white flowers were suspended above the tables in long, elegant arcs.
I had been serving champagne for three hours, and my feet already hurt.
I was standing at the catering station near the east windows, balancing a heavy circular tray of crystal flutes, when I looked down at the counter beside me.
There was a folded white napkin sitting there, and against the bright white fabric I saw something small and dark.
It looked like a tiny black capsule.
I leaned in and whispered to myself, "Wait... what the hell is going on here?"
I had not put it there.
I had not touched that napkin all night.
Before I could even process it, I heard a voice behind my shoulder.
"What's wrong, sweetheart?
Can't even handle a damn serving tray?
That's pretty pathetic."
It was the bride, Camille Sinclair.
She was standing just behind me in her ivory lace gown, her copper-red hair swept over one shoulder, smiling like she had just told the funniest joke in the room.
I had met Camille twice before that night, and both times she had looked through me like I was part of the furniture.
I opened my mouth to answer, but I never got the chance.
A man stepped between us.
It was the groom, Derek Vandermeer, in a dark navy tuxedo, and his face was not smiling at all.
"What the hell happened here?" he said.
"Why does she look terrified?"
Camille rolled her eyes.
"Oh, give me a fucking break!
She's just being dramatic!"
Derek looked at me, then back at her.
"She's white as a sheet, Camille."
"Don't you dare embarrass me at my own damn wedding!" she snapped.
I do not know exactly what happened next, because it happened fast.
Derek's hand moved, and Camille's head turned, and suddenly her cheek was pink and her mouth was wide open.
She pressed her fingers to her face and stared up at him.
"What the actual fuck?!" she cried.
"Are you out of your damn mind?!"
I could see the diamond ring on her hand shaking.
I could not breathe.
I whispered, "I swear I didn't do anything wrong..."
An older woman with short silver-gray hair was standing right behind me, and she was staring at the three of us with her hand over her mouth.
Then, across the ballroom, something else happened.
An older man in a gray suit, broad-shouldered with short gray hair, stumbled backward near one of the tables and collapsed into a chair.
Guests turned.
A woman screamed.
Someone shouted for a doctor.
Derek looked at the fallen man, and something in his face changed.
He turned back toward me, and his eyes went straight to the counter beside my tray.
He walked over, reached past me, and picked up the folded white napkin.
He opened it slowly, and there it was.
The tiny dark object, resting against the clean white cloth.
He held it up at chest level and stared at it.
"Hold the fuck up..." he said.
"What the hell is this doing here?"
I felt tears building behind my eyes.
"I don't know!
I swear to God, that isn't mine!"
He looked from the napkin to me, and then toward the crowd.
"Somebody better tell me the goddamn truth right now!" he shouted.
And every single person in that ballroom turned to look at me.
