Chapter 2

Ryan stopped laughing when Adrian did not release me.

“Enough,” he said. “The joke is over.”

“I agree.” My voice sounded steadier than I felt. “That’s why the wedding is over too.”

The last trace of laughter disappeared from the room.

Ryan came down from the altar and caught my elbow.

“We need to talk. Privately.”

His grip was not painful, but the entitlement behind it was. Even now, he believed he could move me where he wanted and return me when he was ready.

Adrian looked at me.

“Do you want me with you?”

For one weak second, I did.

Then Ryan would only claim his uncle had made the decision for me.

“No.” I released Adrian’s hand. “Ryan needs to hear this from me.”

Ryan pulled me into the bridal suite and shut the door.

The room still held everything I had brought for the happiest day of my life: my mother’s pearl earrings, a bottle of champagne, and the embroidered robe that said Mrs. Carter across the back.

“What the hell was that?” Ryan demanded.

Harper’s lipstick was still smeared across his mouth.

The sight sent a fresh wave of humiliation through me.

“You kissed another woman at our wedding, and you’re asking what I did?”

“I didn’t kiss her. She kissed me.”

“You held her waist.”

“So she wouldn’t fall.”

“And then you let her finish.”

Ryan grabbed a tissue and scrubbed at his mouth.

“She caught me off guard. It lasted three seconds.”

“Three seconds was long enough to push her away.”

He threw the stained tissue into the trash as if removing the lipstick erased what everyone had seen.

“You made your point. Now go back out there and tell them you were joking.”

“I wasn’t.”

“You asked my uncle to marry you.”

“And he didn’t laugh.”

Ryan stared at me.

For the first time, uncertainty broke through his anger.

“You can’t be serious.”

Part of me still wanted him to cross the room, take my hands and tell me Harper had gone too far. I hated that the hope was still alive after everything.

So I gave him one final chance.

“If I had kissed Adrian at the altar, would you still call it a joke?”

“That’s different.”

The answer came without hesitation.

Something inside me finally gave way.

Not my anger.

My hope.

“Why?”

“Because Harper and I have always been like this.”

There it was.

The permanent exception I had spent six years trying to outgrow.

Harper could sit on his lap, wear his clothes, interrupt our anniversaries and kiss him at our wedding.

I was still the unreasonable one for wanting a boundary.

“Then you should have invited her to stand where I was standing.”

A soft knock sounded behind us.

Harper opened the door before either of us answered.

Tears had streaked her makeup.

“I’m sorry,” she whispered. “I honestly thought Emma knew it was a joke.”

Ryan’s face softened immediately.

“Harper—”

“I would never have done it if I knew she’d take it this seriously.”

He handed her a tissue.

The gesture was small.

That was why it hurt so much.

At my wedding, in my bridal suite, my groom comforted the woman who had kissed him while I stood three feet away in the dress I had chosen to marry him.

Harper looked at me over the tissue.

“I’m sorry I ruined your moment.”

“My moment?”

“She apologized,” Ryan said. “What else do you want from her?”

“I want her to leave.”

Harper’s face crumpled.

Ryan stepped between us.

“She came here for me. I’m not throwing her out like she means nothing.”

The words struck somewhere beneath my ribs.

“And I came here to marry you.”

His jaw tightened.

“We are ten minutes away from being married. Don’t throw away six years over thirty seconds.”

Six years.

He used them like a chain.

To Ryan, every year I had loved him was another reason I had to forgive him. To me, those years had just become proof that nothing would change after I took his name.

A knock came at the door.

Our officiant stood outside holding the marriage license.

“I’m sorry to interrupt,” she said. “I need to know whether we’re continuing.”

Ryan reached for the document.

“We are.”

I took it first.

My name was printed beneath his. Two empty signature lines waited at the bottom.

For six months, I had imagined signing it beside him. I had practiced my new last name on scrap paper like a teenager. My mother’s earrings trembled against my neck as I looked down at the future I had wanted.

Giving it up hurt.

But marrying him would hurt longer.

I handed the license back.

“The ceremony is canceled.”

Ryan went still.

“No. Give us five minutes.”

“I’ve given you six years.”

I removed my engagement ring.

The skin beneath it looked pale and exposed. My hand felt strangely light, as if it no longer belonged to the woman who had entered the chapel that morning.

I placed the ring on the unsigned license.

Harper made a broken sound behind Ryan.

Voices were gathering outside. Someone asked why the ceremony had stopped.

Harper looked toward the hallway.

“They’re all going to blame me.”

Ryan turned to her.

“No one is blaming you.”

Not even now.

Not even for this.

“I was only trying to make everyone laugh,” she said.

Then she pushed past the officiant and ran toward the exit.

Ryan looked at the ring resting on our unsigned marriage license.

Then he looked at me.

My chest tightened around one last, foolish hope.

“If you follow her now,” I said, “don’t come back for me.”

For one second, Ryan stood between the bride who had loved him for six years and the woman who had just destroyed our wedding.

Then he ran after Harper.