Everyone was smiling.

The candles were perfect.

And in a few minutes a head waiter I’d never met was going to walk my two children to a table behind a pillar, following a chart drawn up by people enjoying the evening I’d paid for, and the smiles wouldn’t waver at all.

That is the thing about a beautiful surface: it makes cruelty look like etiquette.

The room was flawless, and it was about to be used to break my daughter’s heart, and no one at the head table would feel a single thing go wrong.

Then the head waiter began to guide Cruz and Sofia toward the little table in the shadowed corner.