She understood performance. She understood that the most convincing lies were the ones told with a steady gaze. But tonight, her skin felt too tight for her body.
“Still staring at the same page, I bet.”
Pat was leaning against the doorframe, a glass of scotch in one hand and her tablet in the other. She’d come over for dinner that evening and stayed to work with Lizanne on a few offers.
She didn’t wait for an invitation. She walked in and sat in the velvet armchair, her sharp eyes dissecting Lizanne with the clinical efficiency that had made her the best in the business.
“I’m memorizing,” Lizanne said, her voice tight.
“You’re vibrating,” Pat countered. “And Rose is downstairs looking like she’s still running numbers in her head. Quinn’s right, you know. Jeremy doesn’t walk away from anything without a reason. Not if he’s anything like the man Rose and her family described.”
Lizanne said nothing.
“You should tell her,” Pat said.
“No.”
“Liz—”
“Not tonight.” Lizanne set the script down. “She just exhaled for the first time in weeks. She laughed today. Properly. I’m not taking that from her the same afternoon it arrived.”
“And tomorrow?”
Lizanne looked at her phone on the desk, the device that had felt like a ticking bomb since the moment Reiss had delivered the news and she’d watched Rose’s face flood with relief. Relief Lizanne had purchased. Without asking. Without telling. Without any intention of telling Rose that she’d made the executive decision to make Jeremy Planter go away.
She remembered the cold, authoritative tone she’d used in the car that morning —I cannot be the last person in the room to find out something this important.The hypocrisy was a bitter taste at the back of her throat. She had stood on her moral high ground, playing the part of the transparent partner, while her own pockets were full of things she hadn’t shared.
“I did it to protect her,” Lizanne said.
“I know why you did it.”
“She told me explicitly that she wasn’t paying him. That she wanted to fight it properly.” She paused. “If I tell her how it really happened, it turns us back into a transaction. It makes me the person who bought her daughter’s safety after she explicitly told me not to.”
“You did it to save her from a custody war,” Pat said.
“It doesn’t matter why I did it. It matters that I broke her trust to do it.” Lizanne stood and walked to the window, looking out over the dark grounds, the pool house lights glowing at the far end of the lawn. “She’d never look at me the same way.”
Pat sighed, swirling the ice in her glass. “You’ve always been like this. You think if you carry the weight alone, it doesn’t count as a burden on the relationship. But secrets eat people. You build these beautiful lives and then you lock all the doors and wonder why you feel like you’re suffocating.”
Lizanne sat back down at her desk, her hands flat on the cool wood. The house was quiet.
“Some secrets are worth keeping,” Lizanne said quietly. “To protect the person you love from the parts of yourself that are willing to play dirty to keep them safe.”
“And if she finds out on her own?”
Lizanne looked at the phone. “Then I’ll deserve whatever comes next.” She stood, smoothing her clothes. “But for tonight, she’s happy. Daisy is safe. And I’m going to leave it there.”
She walked to the door, then paused with her hand on the frame.
“Don’t tell her, Pat. Not about Jeremy. And not about Trina.”
“She still trying to get back with you?”
Lizanne shook her head. “No. I haven’t heard from her in weeks.”
Pat looked at her over the rim of her glass. “Good. Let’s hope it stays that way.”
Chapter 30
