Chapter 3 - CECILY PARK
Cecily Park was forty-one.
Lead alterations specialist for Maison Orla, the bridal atelier that designed Vanessa’s gown.
She had altered expensive dresses for eighteen years.
She had worked with difficult brides.
Famous brides.
Drunk brides.
Crying mothers.
Grandmothers convinced sleeves determined morality.
Vanessa still became memorable.
The final fitting was scheduled fourteen days before the wedding.
Vanessa.
Cecily.
One junior seamstress.
Owen.
Why Owen?
Daniel was traveling.
Vanessa wanted family there.
Her mother had died six years earlier.
Her father had died before that.
Owen became the sibling who showed up.
I was invited.
I declined because I had an obstetric appointment.
Vanessa later called that:
“Convenient.”
At 4:18 p.m., Cecily called 911 from the fitting suite.
Not Vanessa.
Not Owen.
Her junior employee, Alyssa Grant, had gone to the restroom moments earlier.
When she returned, Cecily was on the floor beside a mirrored pedestal.
Left wrist visibly deformed.
Cut at hairline.
Vanessa crying.
Owen kneeling.
Their story:
Cecily stepped backward from the fitting platform, caught her heel on a garment bag, and fell into the mirror stand.
Cecily initially said:
“I fell.”
Ambulance transported her.
Distal radius fracture.
Three stitches at hairline.
No life-threatening injury.
Maison Orla’s insurer opened an ordinary workplace incident claim.
Then Cecily called me.
Why me?
Because three days earlier I had asked her to alter my maternity gown.
She had my number.
Her voice:
“Mrs. Hale?”
“Cecily?”
“I need to ask you something strange.”
She was medicated.
Tired.
I said:
“Are you okay?”
“No.”
Then:
“Does your husband always protect his sister?”
I went still.
“What happened?”
Cecily started crying.
May you like
“She pushed me.”
That was the first crack.
