For the good of the order Veronika Crosby shut her book, removed her reading glasses, and placed both items on the end table beside her bed. She glanced at the spot beside her and smiled tenderly at the sight of its occupant. Martin Crosby III was already asleep, his moon-shaped glasses still resting on his prevalent nose. With a quiet chuckle, she reached over to remove them, careful not to let the wire-supported nose pads get tangled in the mess of hair that surrounded her husband’s face from all directions.
With that impossible mission somehow accomplished, the matriarch settled herself beneath the comforters and closed her eyes. However, she found her mind unable to rest. Instead, she kept replaying the earlier events of the day, the conversation she’d had with one of her grandchildren at a family event.
Veronika wished her mind was focusing on how beautiful Sally had looked in her patterned dress, the wash of bold colors that were unusual for the somewhat subdued young woman. But she hadn’t looked at Sally all that much, the two of them staring straight ahead while they spoke. Veronika regretted the deterioration of their relationship over the last few years, particularly the way she had been unable to offer any comfort or strength when Sally’s father had died in that messy, unpleasant affair. But Sally was so damn stubborn. Why couldn’t she understand?
Marty’s son Marcus was at last marrying his long-time love Melanie Lennox this winter. That was the deadline Veronika had established for Sally to, at the very least, be engaged to an acceptable gentleman. Two years Marcus’s senior, it was time she settled down. Veronika hated to put pressure on her descendants, but she was not the one who needed to remain pacified. She too received pressure, with the Tupolovs breathing down her neck to ensure that even their distant American relatives behaved as they ought to. Most things, she could hide from them, just thanks to distance. But marital status was too public to fake.
“You’re almost out of time, dear,” Veronika remembered saying earlier. She reached her hand to find Sally’s lovingly, but the Aladren alumna pulled hers away.
“I know.”
“So what are you going to do?”
Sally rose sharply. “Whatever I want.” And with the clacking of high heels Veronika hadn’t realized her granddaughter could walk in, she was gone.
The elderly woman rubbed her temples as the scene replayed over and over. It would be a long night.