“No, sweetheart,” Adrienne said, reaching for her.
“You can’t go into the party.”
But Taylor was already sliding off the chair with the terrible determination of a small person who has decided something is right.
“He needs to come here,” she said, as if it were the most obvious thing in the world, which — to her — it was.
And before Adrienne’s hand could close on her shoulder, she was gone, out the study door and into the bright roar of the party.
“Adrienne, stop her,” Marguerite gasped, rising.
But there is a particular speed a three-year-old finds when she is on a mission, and Adrienne got to the hallway just in time to watch her daughter march straight into the heart of the ballroom — weaving between silk gowns and crystal flutes, past men discussing yields and zoning, aimed like a small red arrow at the tallest man in the room.
Corbin was raising a glass to toast with Camilla’s father, the senator, when a child took hold of two of his fingers.
Chapter 9 — Don’t Move, Follow Me
“Don’t move, sir.
Follow me.”
The nearest guests chuckled, and one or two lifted their phones to catch the charming moment.
Camilla’s smile went brittle.
“Corbin, don’t indulge this,” she said, low, tugging at his sleeve.