I Take You (24 page)

Will was right: the moon was out. The statues filling the room glowed in its light. The torso of a man, a centurion, a satyr, an armless nymph. The head of an aristocratic woman. A sarcophagus carved with scenes of battle. In the silence and emptiness of the room they were no longer dead pieces of art, but living things. Not part of a collection, but each existing in its own space, as it must have thousands of years ago.

I turned to Will. “They’re beautiful.”

“There’s something else I want to show you.” He unhooked a rope across a small doorway. “We just finished restoring this. Come in.”

I stepped into a tiny room. The only illumination came from the courtyard and from a small frosted window set high in one wall.

“What is this?”

“A cubiculum nocturnum,” Will said. “A bedroom. From a Roman villa that was buried by the eruption of Mount Vesuvius.”

I squinted in the dim light. The walls were covered with images I couldn’t make out. “This is from Pompeii?”

“Close. About a mile away.”

I stood in the middle of the room and turned slowly. My eyes were adjusting, and the frescoes on the walls slowly appeared. Blue skies. Cliffs in the distance. A birdbath—no, two. Birds splashing in the water. Columns twisted with vines. On the two long walls, buildings towering up to the ceiling, piled one on top of the other. Frescoes of a city, for a house in the country. The colors were so bright. Blue, crimson, green, yellow, ochre. I made out temples, statues, urns and burning pyres.

A bedroom, buried for two thousand years. Was anyone in here when the volcano erupted? Sleeping, or making love? Waking up to the explosion, the thermal blast, the rain of ash outside the window?

I expected Will to be doing his standard museum patter—interpreting the iconography, describing how the villa was discovered, how the frescoes were restored. But he wasn’t saying anything.

“You’re awfully quiet,” I said, turning around.

That’s when he stepped forward, took my hand and got down on one knee.

He was holding a ring.

“Do you remember the night we met?” he said. His voice was a little
shaky. “You asked me to say something to you in Latin, and I did, but I wouldn’t tell you what it meant.” I nodded. I couldn’t speak. He slipped the ring onto my finger. It was a simple, engraved silver band.
“‘Quos amor verus tenuit, tenebit,’”
he said, tracing the letters slowly. Then he translated it for me. “I first read that years ago, when I was learning Latin. I loved the rhythm of it. It sounds better in the original, doesn’t it?” He repeated the phrase softly as he turned the ring on my finger. “When I read it, I thought, I’m going to remember this. If I ever fall in love, this is what I’m going to say to her. And so I said it to you, that first night. Because I knew. I knew it was true love, and I knew that it held me, and would keep holding me, forever.” He looked up at me. “Will you marry me, Lily Wilder?”

And that’s when I dropped to my knees and said, “Yes.”

“Yes?” he said, hopeful, half disbelieving. “Yes, really?”

“Yes!” I cried. “Yes really! Yes of course!”

And then we kissed, and we cried, and we laughed and kissed some more. We walked around the rest of the Greek and Roman gallery, holding hands, stopping to kiss, and embrace, and laugh. Then we went home and went to bed.

And it was like those first three days, passionate and true, and afterward, I looked into his eyes and saw all the way into him. But I wasn’t just seeing him. I was seeing us. I was seeing where I was supposed to be. I didn’t want to leave. And I wouldn’t leave. I understood all this, at once. And I accepted it. I didn’t hide from it or run away. It wasn’t until the next day, or the day after, that I started denying, doubting, explaining it all away.

But there’s only one explanation for that yes. And for so many other things. For why I feel happy every time I walk into a room and find Will there. Why I’ve resisted breaking off our engagement against everyone’s advice, against my better judgment, against my own self-interest. Why I call him, and text him, and e-mail him, and generally pester him to death. Why I’m always touching him, and kissing him, and playing with his hair. Why I love to talk with him, and joke with him. And go out with him. And come home to him. Why I am constantly trying to get into his pants. Why I get that fluttering feeling in the pit of my stomach every time he touches me, or smiles at me, or just looks at me.

I said yes because I fell for him the moment I saw him. I said yes because I want to marry him.

Love.

I love him.

Oh, shit!

“Lily?” Mattie says. “The font?”

I look up. “The font is fine, Mattie.”

What am I going to do? How can I realize this
now
? How can I suddenly discover, at the least opportune moment, that I do in fact love the man I’ve spent days and weeks and months wondering whether I love?

Okay, wait. Calm down.

I can fix this. I can figure out a way to stop his mom from stopping the wedding.

How? Not sure. Really not sure about that.

I need time to think. I have no time to think.

We’ve started walking again. Will has his hands in his pockets and is gazing at the ground thoughtfully. His parents are ahead of us. As we circle back toward the front gate, he moves ahead to say something to his father, and Anita drops back to walk beside me.

She skips the pleasantries. “You’re out of time.”

“Why do I have to do this?” I ask. “You found what you found—why not tell him yourself?”

She smiles at me pleasantly. “Shall I tell him about your infidelities, too?”

And there I was, thinking things couldn’t get any worse.

“I know a number of people in New York. Fellow prosecutors, friends from law school.” She raises her eyebrows. “You have quite a reputation.”

“You have a lot of nerve, talking about infidelities.”

After an infinitesimal pause, she replies, “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

My phone pings with a text. I glance at it—something silly from Diane. I’m about to drop it back into my bag when … I don’t.

Anita keeps talking. “Isn’t it better this way? You can’t want this, not really. A fancy wedding? A marriage to someone so obviously unsuited
to you, a marriage destined to fail? It’s not worth throwing away your career.”

“How did you know my career would matter to me?”

She shrugs, twirling the stem of a leaf between her fingers. “I asked around.”

“Of course you did.” I glance down at my phone again.

“I thought I knew my son,” she continues. “But he’s a complete mystery to me. He’s such an intelligent person. He must be blind not to see who you really are.”

That’s about as much as I can take. I stop walking and turn to face her. “Javier says hi.”

Her expression is innocent, slightly puzzled. “Javier? Will’s friend?”

“Yes, that Javier. He told me quite a story about the summer he worked in your office.”

“Did he work there?” She tilts her head, as if she’s making a real effort to recall him. All good trial lawyers are gifted actors, and Anita is no exception. “Now that you mention it, I do vaguely remember … Goodness, that was so long ago!”

“Goodness, wasn’t it? Still, Javier remembers it well. How tired he would get after softball practice. He was
always
so grateful when you would give him a ride home.”

She gazes at me levelly. “I’m not sure what you’re driving at.”

“Aren’t you, Anita?”

“No. I’m not.”

“That makes sense. You probably had lots of affairs with subordinates over the years. This was the only opportunity Javier had to screw a United States Attorney.”

Her face contorts with rage. “How
dare
you?”

“A married one, too,” I continue. “And the mother of his best friend. I can see why that would be a lot more memorable for him than it was for you.”

“This is absolutely outrageous!”

“What did he say? It lasted for months. You couldn’t get enough of each other. Night after night after night.”

“I have
never
—”

“Sometimes you couldn’t even wait until the office was empty. You called him in, closed the blinds in your office, and did it right there on your desk.” I widen my eyes. “A lowly paralegal and Chicago’s chief federal prosecutor. Sounds pretty hot, Anita. The big boss, and her cute, submissive little underling.”

“That’s completely untrue!” she snaps. “I was only an Assistant U.S. Attorney at the time. And it didn’t happen dozens of times. It was more like four or—”

In the sudden silence, I can hear a bird chirping merrily in the tree above our heads. Will and his father laughing about something. A rooster crowing on a nearby rooftop.

Anita is staring at me, her mouth compressed into a thin line.

“That was almost too easy,” I say. “But then, that’s a prosecutor for you. You guys just
love
to tell people when they’re wrong. It’s like you can’t help yourselves.”

“I am warning you,” she says in a low voice. “If you try to smear me with this, you will be very, very sorry. I will deny everything, and I will be believed. My reputation is impeccable. In fact, it’s safe to say that—” She breaks off in frustration. “Are you even listening to me? Stop playing with your phone!”

It’s true—I’ve been fiddling with it the entire time she’s been talking.

“You young people are all alike!” she snaps. I guess she has to vent her rage on something. “Obsessed by these pointless distractions! Texting, and social media, and those moronic games. Will behaves exactly the same way. You’re wasting your lives.”

“It’s not all texting!” I protest. “My phone does a lot of other things. For example, this application right here?”

I hold my phone up to show her.

“It’s called Voice Memo.”

Anita stares at the blinking red dot on the screen.

“It’s very handy,” I add. I stop recording and press Play.

We hear her say: “That’s completely untrue! I was only an Assistant U.S. Attorney at the time. And it didn’t happen dozens of times. It was more like four or—”

I press Stop and smile at her.

“Your expression right now? Priceless. In fact …” I snap a photo
and show it to her. “That’s definitely one for the wedding album, am I right?”

She grabs for the phone, but I hold it out of reach. Her dignity doesn’t allow her to tussle for it.

“You’ll never get away with this,” she hisses. “No one will believe you.”

I nod thoughtfully. “It will be so interesting to see which of us has more credibility. The U.S. Attorney battling sexual misconduct allegations? Or the woman with the audio file.”

She looks murderous. “You can’t possibly—”

“Lily? Anita?”

We look up. Will and his father are waiting for us.

Harry grins. “What are you two girls gabbing about?”

“Nothing!” we say at the same time.

We catch up with them. “I’ll get you for this,” she mutters.

I give her a friendly pat on the rear end. “Sure you will, Mom. Sure you will.”

We’re back at the front gate. I take Mattie’s hands in mine. “I cannot thank you enough. You’ve planned a truly amazing wedding.”

She blushes and beams at me. “I’m so glad you’re pleased. But really, you made it easy, my dear.”

“Did I?”

She cocks her head. “Well, no. But that doesn’t matter now, does it? We’re on our way!”

She starts giving me a lot of instructions about the rehearsal tomorrow. I don’t really listen. I’m too happy. Eventually she disappears, trailing receipts and farewells. Will’s parents head back to the hotel, Anita’s head hanging low.

I turn to Will. “I have a quick call for work in a little while. Wait for me, and then we can get some lunch.”

He frowns, running his hands through his hair. He looks a little downcast.

“Is everything okay, baby?”

“Oh, yeah,” he says, shaking out of it. “Definitely. But I told Javier I’d help him practice his best-man speech. I’ll have to catch up with you later.”

“Okay. Have fun!”

He kisses me good-bye, and I watch him walk away. I turn and stroll in the other direction. I get a text from Freddy:

—u ok?

—everythings great!

—??

—im in love with Will!

—???

—and I thwarted his moms evil plot to ruin my life!

—??????

—wedding on, bitches!

My phone rings. “What are you smoking?” Freddy demands.

“Love!” I cry. “I’m smoking
love
!”

“I was afraid this might happen,” she says. “We drank way too much absinthe last night.”

“It’s not a hallucination. It’s for real. Really, really for real.”

She sighs. “Can we take this step by step?”

“Sure!” I’m practically skipping down the street. I pluck a flower from a vine trailing along a picket fence and put it in my hair.

“So … you love Will,” she says doubtfully.

“I loved him all along, Freddy. I’m over the moon about him.” I tell her about my epiphany. I tell her I know it’s love because I’ve spent all my time trying to reason it out—I should marry Will because of
x
and
y
and z, I shouldn’t marry Will because of
a
and
b
and
c
—instead of examining how I feel. I’ve tried to deny what I felt for him, to do everything I could to reject it. Because I lost love once and didn’t think I deserved it again. Didn’t think I was wired for it, capable of doing it right.

But when you stop denying the truth, and open your eyes and see it? It has a solid quality. You just know.

When I’m done explaining, she doesn’t nag me or doubt me—she gets it. “So the wedding’s on?”

“Yes! His mom can’t rat me out anymore.” The flower falls out of my
hair. I put it back in. “I secretly recorded her admitting that she had an affair with Javier.”

“Wait—
what
?”

I forgot to tell her about that. I guess I’ve had a lot on my mind. I give her a quick recap.

“And that’s enough to stop her?”

“If this got out, it would be a huge scandal. It would ruin her career, just like she tried to ruin mine. I blackmailed the blackmailer, Freddy!”