S.E.C.R.E.T. Revealed (Secret 3)

“Are you coming down? Or … am I coming up?” I asked, a quaver in my voice.

“Let’s meet in the middle,” he said.

I slowly took those stairs one by one, carefully stepping into his broad arms.

“Is this for real, Solange?”

I looked up at him and nodded. He kissed me full on the mouth and for a second he felt all new to me—his hands, his lips, his taste. He broke free a minute later only to pull me up the stairs with him. In the bedroom with the door shut, his body became a place I had been to before and knew so well and missed so much.

He stripped me with the concentration of a doctor removing bandages from someone almost fully healed. I let him. The T-shirt that still smelled like the food truck came flying off. My bra he kept on for a second, admiring it. I had picked out my lingerie carefully this time, hoping there was a chance this could happen. His knuckle traced the shape of my breasts beneath the lace, knowing once it came off there was no turning back; the sight of my breasts had always made that man crazy.

He pulled off my jeans, one leg, then the other. He did it reverently, disbelieving his luck, h

alf waiting for me to stop him, to say, This is nuts; this can’t ever work again. I couldn’t speak, I could only marvel at his sinewy body, my fingers taking ownership with every inch they touched. This stomach, mine. These arms now bracketing me as I lay across the bed, mine. This back my nails are lightly dragging across, mine.

I was so wet by the time he entered me, and he was so hard, so insistent, saying my name over and over in my ear, his voice catching, making me dizzy with every thrust of his body, all I could think was: Mine. Mine. Mine again.

EPILOGUE

CASSIE

When it came time for the wedding, Matilda told me to spare no expense.

“Seriously?” I said, too excited to contain myself. “But it’s during Mardi Gras week. Everything’s going to be more expensive.”

“Spend whatever it takes, Cassie. What’s a wedding but one big fantasy, the fantasy of a lifetime?”

On an unseasonably warm February morning, the skies unbearably blue, the wind sweet, the city getting ready for its big party, Will and I headed down to the French Market at the crack of dawn to pick out the fattest lobsters and the juiciest prawns, which would go into making the biggest backyard jambalaya ever seen in New Orleans. It was Dell’s idea to boil the corn and potatoes over three cauldrons built into the concrete hot tub, drained just for that occasion.

The whole garden behind the Mansion was festooned in ribbons and flowers, Mason jars stuffed with early magnolias, pink-and-white streamers draped off picnic tables, in between which Gus and Finn ran around with the other children over grass strewn with white and purple petals and beads. We wanted this wedding to be perfect and we threw ourselves into every detail, from the dress that Dauphine Mason helped me source and ship from Paris, to the music Mark Drury volunteered to handle, to the cake that we commissioned from Jesse Turnbull.

Claire had been up half the night helping Jesse put the finishing touches on the cake and learning all there was to know about making marzipan roses. But when it came time to help Jesse lift the five-tiered masterpiece out of the back of the van, the only person I’d entrust with that task was Will. To watch those two men cooperatively, carefully, gingerly, tenderly follow me around the side of the Mansion to the table, carrying a wedding cake the size of a small person, was to really know friendship and joy, forgiveness and love.

I’ll admit I was surprised when Solange Faraday pointed to this dress as the one she’d always dreamed of, but when she stepped out of the dressing room at the Funky Monkey wearing it, we all fell in love too.

“You think?” she asked, holding out her long arms covered in creamy Spanish lace. “I saw it in Paris. It’s not too much?”

“It’s definitely too much, but that’s the beauty of it,” I said, laughing at how ridiculously stunning she looked in her off-the-shoulder couture confection, which cinched her tiny waist and flared out in a cloud of pale cream tulle.

“Jesus Murphy Jones and his sister Martha,” Dauphine said, placing her hand over her chest. “Solange. It’s … perfection.”

“It also costs more than my car,” Solange said. “I don’t know if I can accept all this.”

“You should have thought of that before you accepted our Step,” I said, moved to tears by the sight of her.

Weeks later, in the pool house before the ceremony where we all gathered to privately toast the bride, Matilda had attached Solange’s Step Nine charm—Exuberance—to her bracelet.

“There. Something new,” she said. “And you can borrow my old blue handkerchief to cover all the other bridal criteria.”

There was never any question about whether Solange would stay in S.E.C.R.E.T. and take the Tenth Step. Once she reunited with Julius, this was always going to be her final Step, the one fantasy we all wanted to help facilitate. Watching her walk down the aisle at dusk to remarry Julius, the love of her life, their young son giving her away, and watching Julius lift her veil before reciting the vows they had written for each other, my heart burst wide open. And I knew it would never close again.

I scanned the crowd for my lovely assistants: Angela, Kit, Bernice and Pauline were all dabbing tears. Behind them, Jesse casually stretched his arm behind Matilda’s chair. She shifted a little uncomfortably, still trying to get used to his public displays of devotion. After the ceremony, I sidled up to her while Jesse went to get us all drinks.

“What do you think?” I asked.

“It’s a beautiful wedding. We might have stumbled on another source of income. Not that we need the money anymore,” she said, referring to the returned painting. She took my hand. “So, do you miss us, Cassie?”

“I miss you and the girls. Though, if we do decide to cater events here, we’ll see a lot of each other.”