She looks at me thoughtfully. “Well, it’s a relief.”
I blink. “A relief?”
“For Jason,” she clarifies. “Considering his new marriage.” Her gaze drifts back toward the dance floor. “Although that might already be unstable.”
I fold my arms loosely across my chest and study her more carefully. “Unstable how?”
Amber lifts her chin slightly, the way she does when she’s about to deliver information that will rearrange the room. “I saw Faith overhear something. Your son was being…indiscreet.”
Funny how he’smyson when he’s in the wrong, but he’sourson when he’s behaving. “Indiscreet how?”
“Something about how he and Perry could figure something out after the honeymoon so they could have an affair behind Faith’s back.”
My jaw tightens. “I’m not shocked, sadly.”
We both glance toward the ballroom where Jason is now shaking hands with an older couple, grin fixed in place. Faith stands beside him, posture stiff, smile thinner than it was an hour ago. It pisses me off. She’s putting on a grand show on his behalf, knowing what she knows. Suffering with every fake smile.
“He has always struggled with fidelity,” Amber says quietly.
“He has always struggled with impulse,” I correct.
She considers that and nods. There’s a pause before she shifts the conversation again. “You seriously didn’t know before today?”
“No.”
She studies me for another moment, then exhales. “If I had known they were yours, I wouldn’t have had Meron push you out.”
“You admit you had him push me out?”
“Don’t pretend you don’t understand how that conversation went,” she replies. “You’re too smart for that. But if I hadknown my son had half brothers in the picture, I would have recalibrated.”
“Recalibrated how?”
“I would have chosen differently.” There’s no sarcasm in her voice. No mockery.
“You would have protected Jason,” I say.
“Yes,” she replies immediately.
“And now?”
She glances toward the ballroom again, watching Faith as she leans in to speak to one of her bridesmaids. “Now I have to consider something else.”
“Which is?”
“That there are two infants who carry this family’s name, whether we like it or not.”
We stand in silence for a moment. Then she looks at me directly. “Why didn’t she tell you sooner?”
“Fear.”
“Of what?”
“Of everything, Amber. If she had told me at the start of this, I might have reacted poorly. Jason could have flipped out, dumped Faith. Who knows what your reaction back then would have been. Don’t get me started on Mother?—”
She laughs derisively. “Fair enough.”
“And if she had told me when we started dating…I don’t know how I would have taken it, which means she doesn’t either. Imight have broken up with her to keep things clean, or felt like she was admitting it to trap me. All of this could have gone sideways in a hundred different ways, all of them ending with her losing me.”
