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Chapters (66)
  1. Cover
  2. Title Page
  3. Dedication
  4. Chapter One
  5. Chapter Two
  6. Chapter Three
  7. Chapter Four
  8. Chapter Five
  9. Chapter Six
  10. Chapter Seven
  11. Chapter Eight
  12. Chapter Nine
  13. Chapter Ten
  14. Chapter Eleven
  15. Chapter Twelve
  16. Chapter Thirteen
  17. Chapter Fourteen
  18. Chapter Fifteen
  19. Chapter Sixteen
  20. Chapter Seventeen
  21. Chapter Eighteen
  22. Chapter Nineteen
  23. Chapter Twenty
  24. Chapter Twenty-One
  25. Chapter Twenty-Two
  26. Chapter Twenty-Three
  27. Chapter Twenty-Four
  28. Chapter Twenty-Five
  29. Chapter Twenty-Six
  30. Chapter Twenty-Seven
  31. Chapter Twenty-Eight
  32. Chapter Twenty-Nine
  33. Chapter Thirty
  34. Chapter Thirty-One
  35. Chapter Thirty-Two
  36. Chapter Thirty-Three
  37. Chapter Thirty-Four
  38. Chapter Thirty-Five
  39. Chapter Thirty-Six
  40. Chapter Thirty-Seven
  41. Chapter Thirty-Eight
  42. Chapter Thirty-Nine
  43. Chapter Forty
  44. Chapter Forty-One
  45. Chapter Forty-Two
  46. Chapter Forty-Three
  47. Chapter Forty-Four
  48. Chapter Forty-Five
  49. Chapter Forty-Six
  50. Chapter Forty-Seven
  51. Chapter Forty-Eight
  52. Chapter Forty-Nine
  53. Chapter Fifty
  54. Chapter Fifty-One
  55. Chapter Fifty-Two
  56. Chapter Fifty-Three
  57. Chapter Fifty-Four
  58. Chapter Fifty-Five
  59. Chapter Fifty-Six
  60. Chapter Fifty-Seven
  61. Chapter Fifty-Eight
  62. Chapter Fifty-Nine
  63. Chapter Sixty
  64. Chapter Sixty-One
  65. Chapter Sixty-Two
  66. Acknowledgments

“I’m under a little duress, okay?” We managed to laugh, but I also thought of Elliott and the way he continually whisked together flour and that fancy European butter he used so it wouldn’t lump together. How he loathed lumps. I had always loved his tenacity and talent with the whisk.

I appreciated the bond of women that night. They did not assign a value to death or divorce. They viewed it as it was: a premature ending that nobody was ready for.

Into another sleepless night, I reevaluated every memory with Elliott. Was there a moment that had been true? Real? Was there a time he wasn’t altered? When we married on New Year’s Eve, I had thought he was romantic and spontaneous. I had been so happy. Had Elliott just been high? I thought about his drawer full of prescription bottles. And the bank accounts that looked anemic. Money, scary loans, and pills comingled in a toxic cocktail. Had I been so willing to accept all of that? It had taken a blow to my career, an overheard conversation that had been the tipping point.

There would be no happy endings. No lifetime reservoir of treasured memories. No more shared jokes about Elliott’s perfectionism, his desire to walk around naked, or my love of vintage shopping. Just an emptiness where completeness and joy once dwelled. My heart felt scraped up and bruised from the situation. I thought about Miss Havisham and suddenly felt her grief, her completely altered reality. She waited for her bridegroom who never appeared. I was waiting too. But neither of us was getting our happy ending.

Chapter Forty-Three

Chapter Forty-Three

By the time I arrived at the restaurant the next day, it was late in the afternoon. Rex had told Lea that Elliott was meeting with his attorney and would be in later. I walked in with my head held high as if I had not spent the last couple of days complicating Elliott’s life the way he had complicated mine in the nine short months we had been married. Lea had tucked the day’s paper with yet another unnerving headline into her purse: “Wanted—A New Muse. It’s Splitsville. A Kitchen’s Hottest Couple Cools Off.”