Then I stepped down.
Grant called my name immediately. “Natalie—”
I walked right past him.
Up close, I caught his scent—cedar cologne, sweat, and the stale coffee he drank every morning from the blue travel mug I’d bought him ten Christmases ago. Familiar smells. Strange man.
Becca backed away from him as if money itself had turned contagious.
“You lied to me,” she hissed.
He grabbed for her elbow. “Rebecca, stop.”
She jerked free and hurried down the aisle, heels cracking against marble. My dress flashed one last time under the stained glass before she disappeared through the cathedral doors.
Grant started after her.
Aunt Helen blocked him with terrifying elegance. “Don’t you dare,” she said. “You’ve embarrassed this family enough for one lifetime.”
Outside, the California sun hit me like a hard, bright hand. The sky was indecently blue. Cars lined the curb. A few reporters had gathered because my father had been a public figure, but they were suddenly interested in more than his obituary. I could hear the cathedral doors open behind me, then voices rising, then Blackwood’s measured tone cutting across them all.
I sat on the stone steps because my knees went weak without warning.