“The other shoe just dropped for John. He didn’t take it well. I don’t know what’s going to happen now.”

“Right now I’d be happy not to know a lot of things,” Rivera said. And then she got up and closed the door in Angie’s face.

TWENTY

Mrs. June Callahan Rose
requests the honor of your presence
at the marriage of her daughter

Caroline Mae Rose

and

John Ogilvie Grant

And to the reception and luncheon immediately following

Saturday, 8 July

11 in the morning

The Gardens at Old Roses

Ogilvie, Georgia

R.S.V.P.

In the morning Angie found out, to her surprise and considerable horror, that Tony and Rivera were going ahead with the videotaping of the Rose-Grant wedding.

“Nobody canceled, as far as I know,” Tony said as he took stock of his camera bag. “Anybody call you to cancel, Riv?”

“Nope,” Rivera said. She managed a grim smile. “We can handle this without you, if you’d rather not.” She was wearing black slacks and a short-sleeved white shirt, their standard costume for such gigs. She looked rested and calm and without a care in the world, which frightened Angie and irritated her even more.

“You’ll have to,” Angie said. “I’m going into the editing suite to work on the logging.”

“Well, good,” said Tony. “Because there was a message for you on the machine from Patty-Cake. You’ve got a special-delivery envelope in your mailbox in the department. Not that we won’t miss you at the wedding of the season, understand.”

It should have felt good to slam the door on the way out, but it only made her headache worse.

In Angie’s experience the English department, pretty much deserted during the week, was more like a mausoleum on the weekends. This suited Angie, who had almost perfected her schedule to the point that, if she was careful, she could avoid Patty-Cake completely. Of course there was no avoiding e-mail, and the continuous flow of tack-like little notes about her many transgressions. Angie had begun to cut paper dolls out of them and was constructing a collage on one wall of the bigger editing room.

Today there was next to no chance Patty-Cake would be in the department, and so Angie took the direct route to the main office, used her key to get to the mailboxes, and found the special-delivery letter. It had been mailed from a Savannah post office box, and while it looked very official and serious, with its multitude of rubber stamps and stickers, there was no clue at all as to who had sent it. Angie opened it on the spot.