Chapter 100 THE CAKE.

Chapter 100 THE CAKE.
CINNAMON.
"Thank you, Ci. You're the best sister-in-law," Dove said as she hugged me and kissed my cheeks before dancing away.
That was another two million dollars sent her way, bringing the total to fifteen million in just six days. I didn't mind giving her anything since I could afford it, but it had become a regular occurrence, and her explanations for how she used the money were becoming less convincing. What worried me more was her appearance.
Dove had lost a lot of weight and always seemed to be under the influence. I attempted numerous times to arrange a girls' outing with her to find out what was going on with her, but she always found a way to evade it.
I watched her cross the garden in her flowing sundress, without a single care, and I wanted so badly to believe that's what she was.
Exhaling, I pushed aside the worry and turned to face Oliver's birthday.
Dante had lost his mind.
That was the only explanation for what he had built in the backyard of the property we were renting in Birmingham.
The garden had completely disappeared and I meant entirely, as in there was no longer a garden, only a world. A Jurassic-meets-futuristic landscape. Towering inflatable dinosaurs flanked the entrance. Custom-built installations of neon jungle foliage glowed electric green in the afternoon sun. The catering tables were shaped like excavation sites. The cake station had been designed to look like a laboratory and the staff were dressed as scientists.
Oliver had walked out this morning, stopped dead at the back door, and said with three-year-old gravity, "I need to sit down."
We had a good laugh.
I was dressed as a velociraptor tamer in fitted cargo pants tucked into tall lace-up boots, a structured khaki top with gold embellishments, my hair braided back and threaded with tiny bronze beads. I had felt slightly ridiculous until Dante looked at me and stopped talking mid-sentence, and then I had felt spectacular.
The man couldn't hide anything from his face when it came to me. I had always loved that about him.
I scanned the party from where I stood.
Oliver was in the thick of it, his little face overwhelmed with joy, running between stations in his custom dinosaur-rider costume, Thessa a half step behind him in her pink gown and sandals, both of them trailed at a respectful distance by Dante's mom and Khole who hovered attentively.
Thessa reached for Oliver's hand to keep up and he let her without looking. I was so happy to see them play. It was the most beautiful thing to watch.
Dante was across the garden with Tate, among a cluster of business associates who had turned up with their children and their champagne glasses. He had his jacket off already, sleeves rolled. He laughed at something someone said.
His smile was mezmirizing, his immaculate teeth glistening.
"Yes, that's my man," I thought unapologetically to myself.
My eyes continued scanning, landing on the bar. I found Dove there, not particularly drinking, not particularly socializing. Just there, slightly dissociated but still watching the children with an expression I couldn't read from this distance.
Damn. She looked so thin to the point that her collar bones were poking out.
I shook my head.
"Stop," I told myself. "Stop turning everything into something."
"Why is the mother of the celebrant looking like she's doing tax returns on her son's birthday?"
Risa appeared at my elbow out of nowhere, arms crossed, a glass of rosé in one hand, wearing the most aggressively confident outfit I had seen on another human being in recent memory. The corset had opinions. The skirt was more of a suggestion. She looked incredible though.
"You look like you're the one turning three today," I joked.
She twirled. "Every day is my birthday, darling. Now answer the question."
"You're going to cause a diplomatic incident in that skirt. Who are you trying to seduce with that outfit by the way, because you look like a predator out to hunt."
"You caught up. Well, if I'm lucky with a wealthy prey, then my mission is successful." She stopped twirling and looked at me properly.
"My husband is here," I warned.
"I know. No promises though. If he falls into my trap, I'm keeping that delicious man." She winked at me over her glass.
"Risa."
"Relax." She laughed. "Seriously though. You've had that face since the party started. What's going on?"
I exhaled.
I had been carrying it since Dove left my side, and before that since the sixth transfer, and before that since I'd first noticed the weight loss and told myself I was imagining it.
"Can I tell you something in confidence?"
Risa's whole energy shifted, from performing to present, just like that. She turned to face me fully. "Always. I'm your best friend."
"Dove has been asking me for money." I kept my voice low under the noise of the party. "A lot of it. Frequently. In the last six days alone it's been fifteen million."
Risa's eyebrows moved upward.
"Each time the reason is different and thin. And every transfer goes to an account I can't trace. No name attached, no institution I know." I rubbed the inside of my wrist, getting worried. "And she asked me not to say anything to Dante or her mom."
Risa was quiet for a moment, her eyes moving across the garden to where Dove now stood near Khole, watching Thessa and Oliver navigate a dinosaur obstacle course.
"You've transferred fifteen million to an untraceable account," she repeated.
"Over six days. Yes."
She made a sound that wasn't quite a word.
"I don't want to be funding something that's hurting her," I said. "And I don't want to cause a rift in the family by reporting back on her. She trusted me with this. But something doesn't feel—" I bit the insides of my cheek. "Something doesn't feel right, Risa."
"No," Risa said carefully. "It doesn't."
"I just don't want to bring chaos into a space that finally feels peaceful. Dante and I are — we're genuinely good right now. We're solid. And I don't want something I did or didn't do to be the thing that—"
"Wait." Risa turned to look at me with an urgency that hadn't been there before. "You and Dante are solid?"
"Yes—"
"How solid?" She grabbed my arm. "Because you've been keeping secrets from me, Cinnamon Moretti, and I am your best friend and I deserve the full story—"
"That's not the point right now—"
"It absolutely is the point—"
"Dove—"
"Dove can wait forty-five seconds, tell me about you two—"
"Ladies and gentlemen," the event host's voice lifted above the noise, warm and projected, "can we gather the Moretti family at the cake station? It's time to sing for our birthday boy."
"Excuse me," I told Risa, walking towards where Dante and Oliver already stood.
Oliver saw the cake and sat down on the grass, legs crossed, mouth open, staring up at the three-tiered creation that had been designed to look like a dinosaur emerging from a volcanic island. It had been made by a bakery in London who had flown their lead confectioner in yesterday specifically for this, which was information I had given Dante's credit card and chosen not to examine too closely.
"Baby." I crouched beside him. "You have to stand up to blow out the candles."
He pointed at the cake without looking at me. "Mommy. There's a dinosaur coming out of it."
"There is."
"A real one?"
"Not a real one."
He thought about this. "Okay." He stood.
Dante lifted Oliver onto his hip in one motion, and the three of us stood in front of that ridiculous, magnificent, only-Dante-Moretti-would-do-this cake while everyone gathered and the singing started — off-key and enthusiastic and full of love — and Oliver covered his face with both hands because he was embarrassed and delighted at the same time.
I looked at Dante over Oliver's head.
He was already looking at me.
He reached out and tucked a strand of hair behind my ear and I leaned my head briefly into his hand and the cameras went off and I didn't care.
Oliver blew out the candles on the third try.
The garden cheered.
My young gentleman, a replica of his father.

Dante's mom found me by the dessert table twenty minutes later, cake plate in hand, wearing her character costume.
"The company reports have been exceptional," she smiled. "You're the best decision Dante made in his life. I won't stop singing that.."
"Thank you mom."
"No, thank you for coming into our lives and blessing us with such a lovely boy as Oliver." She ate a forkful of her cake with quiet satisfaction.
I observed her, trying to decipher her body language for any signs of worry, but she appeared happy and vibrant. This suggested that there might not be anything wrong with Dove. Nonetheless, I chose to address the topic.
"I can't believe you take interest in the affairs of the company," I started off lightly.
"I'm retired, not dead." She allowed a small smile. Then, softer, "How are you, Cinnamon. Not the company. You."
"I'm good."
She tilted her head.
"Really."
She kept the tilt.
I sighed. "I have some things on my mind. Nothing serious."
"Mm." She looked out across the party. "I feel something around you today. A tension that isn't coming from the party." She looked back at me. "I'm not telling you to ignore it. I'm telling you not to carry it alone. You have a habit of carrying things alone."
"You've been to too many retreats," I said fondly.
She pointed her fork at me. "And every one of them was worth it."
I laughed and she laughed and I ate my cake.
"Mom, we should go shopping with Dove one of these days. She's buying vintage."
Dante's mother went still.
The fork paused halfway to her mouth.
"Vintage?" she repeated slowly.
Something in her expression shifted.
Not surprise.
Recognition.
She lowered the fork.
"Cinnamon," she said quietly, "Dove hasn't bought anything in months and yet she keeps spending more. I don't know on what."