“Wish me luck,” I said, as if my going to dinner was equivalent to being in the Roman Coliseum to fight for survival.

She widened her eyes, and I walked out and down the hallway, proudly defying every ancestor in every framed portrait along the walls. I paused at the stairway when I heard laughter below. Was that my mother’s voice? What had Garland done to charm her so quickly? I wondered, and started down with more enthusiasm.

They were all waiting for me in the study. My mother, to my surprise, was having a martini, something I rarely saw her do in the presence of anyone but my father. All three were drinking the same thing. My mother looked embarrassed by it, especially because of the expression on my face.

“These two fools insisted I imbibe,” she said.

“We all should,” Garland said, pouring one for me.

My mother was about to say something when it must have suddenly occurred to her that I was going to marry this man. The door to my childhood had been slammed shut. And so, too, apparently was her mouth. She sat back when I took the filled martini glass. It wasn’t something I was used to drinking; in fact, I had barely tasted one once.

“Shall I make a toast?” Garland asked.

“I should be the one to do that,” my father said.

“At dinner. Permit me this one first,” Garland said, raising his glass. “To my new family, who I hope will merge so smoothly with mine that there will truly seem to be no differences between the House of Foxworth and the House of Dixon.”

“Hear, hear,” my father said, and we all sipped our drinks.

“I’d like you all to be as familiar with Foxworth Hall as I am. Tomorrow we shall tour the house and then, depending on the weather, of course, take one of my carriages to traverse the property. We could even take rowboats, Harrington and I at the oars, of course, and have a spin around the lake. I hope that’s all to your liking,” he said, directing himself to my mother.

“Very much,” she said. How quickly he was charming her, I thought.

He smiled at me as if to say, See? This will be easy.

Maybe it was already the effect of the martini. Maybe it was simply all that I had done, seen, and heard in so short a time, but I laughed a bit too loudly. My mother’s eyes widened, and my father smiled.

“Only one of those for her,” my mother said.

“Absolutely only one,” Garland agreed. He winked. For the moment, at least, he looked like he was enjoying keeping our secret hidden from my mother. He expected I did, too. Did he know me that well already?