An Invincible Summer (Wyndham Beach #1)(52)

This had to be a mistake. Please let this be a mistake.

Someone had left a column printed out from Philly News and Views Online and left it smack in the middle of her desk. The gossip site item was dated yesterday, and the section circled in red made her blood run cold.

Rumor has it that the online blog known as TheLast2No—a private members-only spot where women go to bitch about their lyin’, cheatin’ ex-partners—was set up by a well-known Center City attorney who was dumped by her husband who’d been having an affair with one of their paralegals. The attorney, who identifies herself on the site as Annie Boleyn (cute, no?), was reportedly devastated to have been—yes, I’ll say it—the last to know, and obviously had not taken the news of the affair well. It’s been said that the spurned attorney had continued to pretend all was fine with her marriage for several months after the husband left seeking greener—read younger—pastures, but everyone in the firm knew otherwise. Talk about a fall from grace! It’s only a matter of time before Annie Boleyn is unmasked and the entire legal community will know what a desperate woman looks like. Next time—and there probably will be a next time—skip the humiliation and #justletgo.

Grace felt sick, a wave of nausea overtaking her. She closed her eyes and tried to will it away. How, she wondered, had anyone found out? She hadn’t told anyone—not one person!—about TheLast2No. Who could have figured it out? And who had given—she checked the byline—Amy Spinelli the news?

She was sure by this time tomorrow her name would be out there in connection with the blog. “Talk about a fall from grace!” Seriously? Could it have been more obvious? Combined with the other information in the piece, it was clear as glass that she was Annie Boleyn, that TheLast2No was her blog, and that she was the desperate woman who hadn’t seen what everyone else in her office had known. Amy Spinelli might just as well have written “Grace Flynn” in parentheses after “a well-known Center City attorney who was dumped by her husband who’d been having an affair with one of their paralegals.”

Grace held her head in her hands but wouldn’t let the tears fall. She couldn’t take any more humiliation. She just didn’t have the strength.

Closing her laptop and packing it with a few files in her tote bag, she cleared her desk, turned out the light, and, closing the door behind her, walked to the elevator with her head high. In the parking garage, she loaded her bag into the back seat, started the car, and drove off as if nothing were wrong. She made it all the way to Spruce Street before she let the tears fall.

She’d thought her humiliation had been complete before, thought she’d managed to salvage a certain amount of dignity by ignoring the happy couple in the office and going about her business. Apparently, someone was determined to ensure that she wasn’t going to be able to maintain whatever pride she still had.

Without thinking about where she was headed, she found herself on the Schuylkill Expressway headed for Bryn Mawr.

Once in her mother’s driveway, she broke down and sobbed for twenty minutes. Finally, hiccuping and blotchy faced, she got out of the car and started toward the front door.

“Gracie? That you?” her mother called from the top of the driveway. Maggie wore old jeans with dirty knees, one of Art’s old Penn State sweatshirts, and sunglasses. “I was just trying to take advantage of this beautiful weather to get a jump on my garden. Whoever heard of sixty-five sunny degrees in February?”

Grace walked up the drive slowly. Now that she was here, what could she possibly say to her mother to prepare her for the embarrassment headed their way?

“I thought I’d . . .” Maggie paused. “Grace? Are you all right?”

Grace shook her head. “No, Mom. I’m not all right . . .”

Forty minutes later, the dam having burst, Grace had told her mother everything, from Zach admitting he was in love with someone else to the humiliation she’d suffered at Zach’s and Amber’s hands to setting up the blog and letting her feelings rip.

“It felt like such a safe place to unload it all. It made me feel like I had some control over one small part of my life when everything else was out of control.” Grace sat at the kitchen table, the picture of total dejection. “I could talk about how devastated I’d been when Zach left me and how horrified I was when I found out he and Amber were a couple. I had no idea, Mom. But apparently everyone else in the office knew. I made a total fool out of myself.”

“Sweetheart, why didn’t you tell me? Why did you hide all this . . . this pain? And for the love of all that’s holy, why didn’t you tell me about Zach and Amber?”

“I didn’t want you to know what a failure I was at marriage. You and Dad had such a perfect life together, and that’s what I wanted. It was just too hard to admit I’d failed.”

“Grace, you didn’t fail. Zach failed. Look, your dad and I had a great marriage, but it wasn’t perfect. We had our challenges, just like everyone does.” Maggie sighed. “I just wish you’d talked to me about it.”

“I just couldn’t face you. I was afraid you’d think I was flat-out stupid for the way I handled it. Mom, I pretended we were still together weeks after he moved out, but everyone knew we weren’t—but I didn’t know that—so I looked like a lying fool. And I did everything I could possibly think of to win him back. There was nothing I wouldn’t have done, like, I had no pride left whatsoever. When I found out everyone had known not only about him leaving, but about his relationship with Amber, I just wanted to die.” Grace grabbed a tissue from the box her mother offered her. “I was so hurt. I had to go in there every day and face him, with her. Everyone knew he’d dumped me for her.”