The Sixth Wedding (28 Summers #1.5)(20)

Their circumstances were different now, of course. Ursula had lost the election and she was no longer in public life. No one cared about Ursula de Gournsey and Jake McCloud anymore; their divorce hadn’t even been noted by the press. It wouldn’t matter who Bess told about this secret now, but she still felt guilty because it was her father’s story to tell and not hers. What would he think about Bess sharing it with Lincoln Dooley?

Well, he would either be appalled or he would think that Link deserved the truth, just as Bess did.

She’ll go with the second choice since she can’t very well back out now. Link is looking at her expectantly.

“They had an affair,” Bess says. “One weekend a year. Labor Day weekend, actually.”

Link’s brow creases. “Does that have anything to do with why everyone is up on Nantucket this weekend?”

“They’re reliving the summer of 1993—that’s when your mom and my dad met. Your uncle and your dad were there too.”

“Ahhhh,” Link says. “Thirty years ago.”

“Yup.”

“So did they see each other only on Labor Day weekend?”

“Yes. Always on Nantucket. From 1993 until, well, 2020.”

“Where was I when this was happening?” Link asks. He looks at Bess as though she might have the answer. “You know what? I always, always spent Labor Day weekend out in Seattle with my dad. All through growing up, I did that. Except for one year I went to DC to see my uncle. And another year, I went with an old girlfriend to New York City.”

Bess feels herself bristling at the mention of an old girlfriend. “My dad said they met every single Labor Day weekend no matter what. Always at your cottage. They never missed a year.”

“And nobody found out?” Link says. “Your mom never found out?”

A server sets their order of pakoras on the table; they’re golden brown, fragrant, and still too hot to touch, never mind eat. Bess thanks him and points to her wineglass. She’s definitely going to need another.

“My mom found out, or suspected, anyway. She went to Nantucket in 2019 to confront Mallory.”

Link’s eyes widen. “She…”

“She was running for president. She didn’t think she could have it coming to light.”

“Why did she go to Nantucket? Why didn’t she just talk to your dad?”

“She was afraid my dad would leave her,” Bess says. “She believed the only person who could put an end to the affair was your mom.”

Link leans back in his chair and takes a sip of his beer. Bess nudges the plate of pakoras toward him. He takes one and blows on it.

“I’ll ask the obvious question. Why didn’t your dad just leave your mom earlier? Why didn’t he leave her in year five or ten or fifteen? My mother—” Link sets the fritter down without tasting it and stares out the window. “She never got married. She had boyfriends when she was young and she hooked up with my dad, obviously, and there was a guy she was serious about when I was little, but that didn’t work out. She was alone. I could never understand it, my friends didn’t get it—so many of them thought she was super hot. My grandma used to get on her case all the time about meeting someone.” He sets his elbows on the table and drops his head in his hands. “Now, all I can think is that she wasted her life, year after year, waiting for Labor Day weekend to roll around. How do you live like that? Only seeing the person you love three or four days a year?”

“My dad said it was…well, excruciating was his exact word.”

Link gives a short, bitter laugh. “Excruciating for him? No offense, Bess, but he was married. He went right home to your mother.” Link pushes away the pakora on his share plate and Bess thinks, Oh no, no, no! She only wanted to tell Link what she knew. She didn’t mean to hurt him or make him angry. “You can see how this little arrangement…”

“Same time next year,” Bess says. “It was a movie they used to watch.”

“Yeah, well, the same time next year was profoundly unfair to my mother.”

“That’s what I told my dad,” Bess says. “The arrangement was lopsided. And sexist.” Bess remembers how Jake had patiently endured her tirade about white male privilege. “He assured me that the arrangement was Mallory’s choice. I guess there were a couple of junctures when my dad said he wanted to be with her on a permanent basis and she turned him down. She didn’t want to leave Nantucket.”

“She never would have left the island.”

“He said she was happy. He told me she had a full life.” Bess’s second glass of wine is dropped off by none other than Shamin herself.

“Is everything okay here?” Shamin asks, eyeing the untouched pakoras. “We are busy preparing your entrées.”

“Delicious!” Bess says, too eagerly, and she takes a perfunctory bite of pakora.

“Very good,” Shamin says, smiling, and thankfully, she leaves them.

Bess turns back to Link. “I’m not pretending to know what your mother’s life was like. You would know that far better than me. But my dad claims she had her job, her cottage, friends, a community…and you.”

Link looks at her incredulously and she can’t help but agree with him. She’s ridiculous! She’s trying to justify what happened between their parents when it was, quite clearly, unfair to Mallory. But then, Link does an amazing thing. He reaches across the table for her hand. Bess tries to act natural but she instantly flushes from the neck up. She likes Link so much—okay, she realizes she doesn’t really know him, but she’s been drawn to him since she first set eyes on him, stepping out of the cottage on Nantucket. He’d looked so forlorn, a boy on the verge of losing his mother. He’d been trying to escape the adults inside and, like Bess, he was probably wondering what the hell Jake McCloud was doing there. But he was kind and funny with Bess, and she thought she’d seen a spark in his eyes, like maybe he thought Bess was pretty, and then he offered to show her the beach. She’d wanted him to ask for her number before she left but her dad had been standing there and it wasn’t clear if she and Link would ever see each other again, so what would be the point?