“Telling the world what an absolute sack of shit he is was the right move,” she says firmly. “If it were up to you, you would have swept it all under the rug and let him go on his merry way, right?”
She pauses, giving me enough time to answer, but I keep my jaw clamped shut because she’s right and I hate it. I wanted everything to blow over quickly and quietly, even if it meant no consequences for him.
Daphne correctly interprets my silence. “Well, I wasn’t about to let him get away with that. Janelle was too sweet to do it, but I won’t sit back and watch people I love get played without retribution.” She sits up even straighter, leveling me with ahard stare. “I wanted that man ruined. So I told the press about what he did—how he left you in the worst possible way. It was never meant to be a slight against you.Youdidn’t do anything wrong. He did. And now he’s suffering for it.”
It’s my turn to frown, confused. “What do you mean he’s suffering?”
Her brows knit together the best they can with the beautifully subtle Botox she’s had. “You really don’t know?” She waits until I shake my head before letting out an exasperated breath. “The man is destroyed.”
If she means emotionally, then yeah, I saw that embarrassing shit firsthand. But in any other way? I have no idea what she’s talking about.
“Janelle told me he came crawling back to you,” Daphne goes on. “Did you ask him why?”
“No, I didn’t.” Because it didn’t matter. I already knew what I wanted, and it wasn’t him. I was only there to put the final nail in the coffin of our relationship.
“It’s because he’s losing money hand over fist and his reputation is shot.” She leans forward, making sure I’m not missing a single detail of this. “He came back because he needs you to fix it all. Between how he left you and the fact thatyouwere the reason his business stayed successful for so long from riding your coattails, he’s cooked. And the fact that he tried to get you to forgive him means he knows it too.”
Damn Janelle for telling her my business, and damn Daphne for punching me in the gut like this. Part of me already knew Étienne didn’t come back solely because he missed me and couldn’t live without me, but I didn’t bother to interrogate it.
“He didn’t even apologize,” I hear myself say. “So he wasn’t exactly begging for forgiveness.”
Daphne stares open-mouthed at me for a moment. “Wow,” she finally mumbles. “Fuck that guy.”
“Fuck that guy,” I wholeheartedly agree.
We’re both silent again, processing, some of our animosity slowly drifting away.
“I’m sorry if what I did hurt you,” she says after a few more beats. Despite everything, it’s an apology I believe, even if I’m not ready to forgive. “And when I talked to the press after your second wedding—”
“I’m sorry,what?” I splutter.
Her face contorts in disbelief once again. “Do you seriously not remember?”
I almost snap that no, I definitelydon’tremember, but then I have to consider all the lies Thomas and I have told about what happened that night, including actually remembering it.
“I was there,” she says slowly. “I was your witness, literally signed your marriage license. Were you so drunk that you don’t even remember that?”
I’m kicking myself now for not looking closer at our marriage certificate, focusing only on Thomas’s and my names together, not bothering to search farther down the page for anyone else listed there.
“Stella,” she admonishes. “I can’t believe you.”
I hold up a hand to stop her incoming tirade of disappointment. “We can save the guilt-tripping for later. How did you end up being the witness at our wedding?”
Daphne looks like she wants to protest more but ends up huffing instead. “I ran into you and Thomas at the pharmacy,” she explains. “You were just…all over each other.” Her lip curls in disgust at the memory. “Gross as that was, I couldn’t believe how happy you were. I hadn’t seen you light up like thatin ages, and the way he was looking at you…I’m sorry, Stella, but I can’t think of a single time Étienne looked anything other than smug to have landed you. But Thomas was ready to worship the ground you walked on.”
My throat tightens. I wish I could remember all of this, but the knowledge that Thomas has viewed me in such a way since the very beginning makes me all the more certain about being together.
“I don’t know what led to you two talking about getting married,” she says, “but you’d already made your minds up by the time you spotted me. I’m guessing you don’t remember making fun of me for buying antacids because—”
“Because you’re old and can’t eat tomato sauce after nine p.m.,” I finish for her, wincing. “It’s coming back to me.”
She rolls her eyes but thankfully doesn’t dwell on it. “Anyway, you practically dragged me with y’all to the chapel, begging me to take photos so you could ‘show your future kids,’ which were your words exactly, by the way.”
Okay, yikes at me getting ahead of myself on about ten thousand levels. “And you didn’t try to stop us?”
Daphne barks out a laugh. “As if that was even possible. You were both dead set on doing it, there’s no way I could have talked you out of it. And honestly…” She blows out a breath, starting to seem a little sheepish about her involvement. “I kind of wanted to see where it went. I wanted you to have something to rub in Étienne’s face, to show off that you could move on from him. Something more than just a onetime hookup. That’s why when the reporter approached me, I shared all the details. I wanted it to get back to him.”
I want to be mad, want to yell at her for all her absolutely ridiculous machinations, but all I can manage to do is put my elbows on my knees and take it all in. She might not have goneabout any of this in the right way, and she caused me more trouble than I ever thought possible, but when it really comes down to it all…Daphne did me a favor. She’s the reason I’m even with Thomas today. Without her meddling, I would have gotten that annulment without a second thought and moved on with my life.