The Rabbit at the Gala
Chapter 01 - The Rabbit at the Gala
The ballroom of the Vale Grand Hotel glittered like a place where nothing bad was ever allowed to happen. Crystal chandeliers burned above silk gowns, waiters moved between tables with silver trays, and a string quartet played while cameras followed billionaire hotel owner Ethan Vale through his annual children’s charity gala.
Grace Bennett kept her eyes on the glasses she was collecting. Temporary catering work paid better than sewing repairs in her apartment, and she needed every dollar. She had learned long ago that wealthy rooms were easiest to survive when no one noticed you.
Then a little girl in a pale-blue dress ran across the marble floor, clutching a white stuffed rabbit.
Grace stopped so suddenly that two glasses rattled on her tray.
The rabbit’s left ear bent forward. A satin blue bow circled its neck. Beneath the bow hung a tiny silver crescent moon, scratched near the tip. Grace knew that scratch. She had made it herself with a sewing needle seven years earlier while attaching the charm to a toy for the daughter she was expecting.
The daughter she had been told never survived her first night.
The child looked up at Grace with clear gray eyes. “Her name is Luna,” she said. “She gets scared at parties.”
Grace’s throat closed. Along the rabbit’s paw ran three uneven blue stitches—her stitches, made while she had waited in a maternity home with rain tapping against the window.
A man in a midnight-blue tuxedo hurried over. Grace recognized Ethan Vale from every business magazine in the city. He knelt beside the girl and rested a protective hand on her shoulder.
“Emma, I asked you not to run off.”
“I wanted Luna to meet her,” Emma said, pointing at Grace. “She looked sad.”
Grace lowered the tray before her shaking hands dropped it. “Where did you get that rabbit?”
Ethan’s expression hardened at once. “Why?”
Before Grace could answer, an elegant older woman crossed the ballroom. Beatrice Vale, Ethan’s mother, went pale when she saw Grace staring at the toy.
Grace noticed. So did Ethan.
The music continued, but the four of them stood inside a sudden silence.
Beatrice reached for Emma. “Darling, come with me.”
Grace stepped back, frightened by the force of her own hope. “Please. I only need to know where it came from.”
Emma hugged Luna tighter. “It came with me when I was a baby.”
The tray slipped from Grace’s fingers. It struck the carpet without breaking, but every face nearby turned.
Ethan stared at her as if she had crossed an invisible line.
May you like
Grace stared at the crescent moon and understood that the past had not disappeared.
Someone had carried it into the ballroom in a little girl’s arms.
