Good Little Wives by Abby Drake Page B

Caroline gently explained that a good marriage often meant compromise, that even she—even Caroline Davis Meacham—had begun her married life in Connecticut, hadn’t she?
    Then Caroline told Chloe she’d be able to use the sacrifices as leverage in later years when she wanted a country house, a year in Europe, or separate bedrooms.
    Life, after all, was just a game, and winning was everything. Sometimes the prizes came as trinkets, like the ones that Jennie now rolled in on the dessert cart. Caroline smiled because the cart was so apt.
    â€œSit down and help me open my goodies.”
    Jennie sat and oohed and aahed while Caroline undid the bows, pulled off the lids, and extracted one bauble after another: a small Steuben piece from Katherine Ramsey, whose husband was chairman of Ramsey and Potter; an Orrefors nut dish fromVera Stanley, married to Richard Stanley of the Newport Stanleys; a Correia perfume bottle from Meredith Gibson, wife of Jonathan Gibson, president of Freedom Securities. The most fun, of course, were turquoise boxes from Tiffany’s because something fabulous was guaranteed to be inside.
    Not that Caroline threw parties for the trinkets.
    But like chairing the committees for the hospital gala in spring, the library fund-raiser in autumn, and the holiday museum ball, it was more fun to keep the façade alive than to look in the mirror each morning and glimpse who she was when the spotlight was off.
    â€œOh, look,” Jennie said, “this one’s from the new Mrs. DeLano.”
    It was a ceramic wall plaque shaped like a duck. Friends make life ducky was painted on its wing.
    Caroline looked at Jennie.
    â€œWell,” Jennie said, because even Jennie had more sense than Yolanda, “it’s the thought that counts. And besides,” she added, “while she was at your party, her husband was being murdered.” As if that had anything to do with any of this.
    Caroline sighed. She did not want to think about Vincent. It had been too painful to stand at his funeral and stare at the ground and not at the mourners for fear she’d lock eyes with the only true love that she’d ever known.
    The only real love.
    The only honest lover.
    The only person for whom Caroline Meacham had almost given up everything.
    She did not want to think about it because it made the ache worse.
    Without a word she set the duck back in its box and handed it to Jennie. Then she stood up. “I can’t do this right now,” she said, tossing aside the papers and the ribbons. “I must rework the seating charts for the gala.”
    She left the music room, her trinkets forgotten, her mask safely back in its place.
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    It wasn’t until Bridget had stopped at Dean & DeLuca’s to pick up dinner (her cook Lorraine worked only Monday through Thursday) and wheeled into the garage at her own mini mansion, that she was struck by a bolt of inspiration.
    â€œMy God,” she shouted in English, not French, because no one was around. “Why didn’t I think of that before?”
    Snapping off the ignition, she started to laugh, because if it hadn’t been for Caroline, Bridget might never have figured out the answer to all—well, some of—her problems.
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    At times like this Dana wished she had never quit smoking.
    As Grand Central Parkway merged into I–278, she barely watched the road while she ransacked the glove box. Finally she located a stick of old gum. Unwrapping it quickly, she shoved it into her mouth.
    Chomp, chomp.
    She had her cell phone but not her headset, and in the great State of New York one wasn’t allowed to drive while holding the phone. If she’d been in her own car, she could have called Bridget and shocked her with Lauren’s confession.
    But she wasn’t in her own car because she’d driven Steven to LaGuardia after the funeral and the luncheon because he was headed for Cleveland, on the road again.
    Of all