Chapter 1 #2
Dark brown hair, longer on top. A neatly trimmed beard frames his strong jaw and full lips. Broad shoulders filling out his suit in a way that suggests power held in careful check.
His dark and intense eyes are on me. Not with the warm look a soon-to-be brother-in-law should give a bride. Something harder. Assessing. Judging.
I force my gaze back to Cameron. On the man I’m supposed to want.
Chin up. Shoulders back.
I’ve spent years learning how to be invisible while standing in plain sight.
I can survive one more day of it.
Father and I reach the altar, and he releases me with a firm nod toward Rosa, Cameron’s grandmother, which means business is concluded.
I step forward to stand opposite my groom, bouquet clutched in sweaty hands. Up close, I can see the tension on Cameron’s face, the slight pallor beneath his tan.
“Hi,” he whispers, so soft only I can hear.
“Hi,” I whisper back.
Behind him, Julien shifts his weight, his gaze still burning into me. I already got the message. He hates me. What more does he want?
The reverend begins to speak, his voice resonating through the church. Words about love and commitment that sound hollow in the space between Cameron and me.
I focus on his face, trying to imagine waking up to it every morning. Trying to feel anything beyond the polite appreciation of his objective attractiveness.
This is for Amelia. This is the one thing I can do to help her.
“If anyone can show just cause why this couple cannot lawfully be joined together in matrimony, let them speak now or forever hold their peace.”
The traditional pause lengthens uncomfortably. Someone coughs in the back pews. My heart pounds against my ribs like it’s trying to escape.
“Cameron Richard Mora, do you take Dakota Levine to be your lawfully wedded wife? Do you promise to love, honor, and cherish her, in sickness and in health, for richer or poorer, as long as you both shall live?”
Cameron takes one of my hands, and I squeeze back. We can do this. We can get through this ceremony, and afterward, we’ll figure out how to make this arrangement work.
We were friends once. We can be friends again.
The silence stretches, grows teeth.
“Cameron?” the reverend prompts.
“I…” His eyes, wide and pained, lock with mine.
Something’s wrong.
“Cameron,” the reverend says again, his voice dropping lower.
From somewhere in the crowd, a woman’s voice calls out, “Cam!”
Every head turns. A woman moves into the middle of the aisle.
Beautiful, tall, athletic with blonde, shoulder-length hair, and not dressed for the occasion in casual jeans, a white t-shirt, and a brown leather jacket.
Her blue eyes are fixed on Cameron, her expression a mix of desperation and determination.
Don’t tell me.
Cameron turns, his face transforming at the sight of her. “Sienna.”
The church erupts in hushed whispers.
He turns back to me, his face a mask of misery and resolve. “I’m sorry. Dakota, I’m so sorry. I can’t do it. I can’t marry you.”
My mother gasps. Somewhere to my left, Father makes a strangled sound of rage. And I…
I should feel devastated.
Humiliated.
Instead, a treacherous relief floods through me, so powerful my knees nearly buckle.
No!
No, no, no.
What about the treatment?
Without the money, Amelia’s treatments stop.
We lose everything.
What have I done wrong?
“I tried,” Cameron continues, his voice breaking. “I swear I tried to do what was right for everyone. But I can’t promise to love you when I—” he glances at the woman, Sienna, his expression cracking open with naked longing. “When my heart belongs to someone else.”
I look at her and see it.
Real love.
Not arranged. Not convenient. Not practical.
Just pure, inconvenient, impossible love.
A strange emptiness opens inside me. Not envy, exactly. How can I condemn him for wanting what I’ve secretly wished for myself?
A harsh cough cuts through the murmurs. A guest in the back row doubles over, a wet sound tearing from his throat. Everyone turns to stare.
“Sorry,” the man gasps, holding up his hands. “Sorry, I—”
Someone pats his back while others shoot annoyed glances.
“Sorry.” He coughs one last time, then sits up straight. “Please continue.”
“This marriage will happen.” My father strides forward, grabbing my arm with bruising force. “We have an agreement.”
“An agreement built on blackmail.” Julien steps forward, his voice a low, controlled rumble that makes my hairs stand. “This ends now, Nicklas.”
The church goes so quiet I can hear the rustle of my dress as I turn to look at him. Blackmail?
“What?” I whisper.
Julien glares at me like I personally orchestrated this whole disaster.
“Julien.” Amelia places her hand on his arm. “I’m sorry, I—”
Her voice breaks, and the hard lines around his eyes soften, a flicker of the boy he once was glimpsing through.
“Not your fault, Meli,” he says. “Your father threatened to destroy our family business with inside information unless we agreed to this marriage.”
“That’s a lie,” Father hisses.
The whiskey makes him mean, but the debt made him desperate. So desperate, he used me for this…
“Oh, for God’s sake, enough with the dramatics.” Rosa moves to stand before my father. She barely reaches his chest but somehow makes him step back. “You manipulative pendejo. My Richard trusted you. I kept my silence, but no more. Bring it on if you’re brave enough.”
My father’s face flushes deep red. “You—This—”
“The girl’s being jilted at the altar. It’s embarrassing, not the apocalypse. Take it as a gift.” She turns to me and pats my arm, smelling of peppermints and expensive perfume. “And mija, sometimes the wedding that doesn’t happen is the best gift you’ll ever receive.”
Does she think I knew? “I—I didn’t know,” I whisper.
The words feel inadequate, pathetic.
Rosa takes my cold hands in her warm, gnarled ones. Her fingers are twisted with arthritis, but her grip is surprisingly strong. “Of course you didn’t. Men like your father count on the silence of good women.”
She winks, patting my cheek. “Don’t worry. This wedding was shit anyway. The flowers? Hideous. Did your mother pick them?”
My mother throws her hair back. “I beg your pardon?”
My throat tightens.
The coughing man staggers to his feet, crashing against the wall, and several people move to help him. His face has gone gray, blood vessels prominent beneath his skin.
The person closest to him, an usher in a dark suit, touches his arm. “Sir, are you alright? Do you need—”
The man’s head snaps up, and an impossible sound emerges from his throat. Not a cough this time. Something animalistic. Primal. Wrong.
Without warning, he lunges at the usher, teeth sinking into the man’s neck with savage force. Blood sprays across white flowers and satin ribbons, and the usher screams, a high, terrified sound that doesn’t belong in a church, while falling back onto the ground.
Everyone stares.
Then chaos erupts.
People surge toward the exits. Someone knocks over a candelabra, and small flames lick at the carpet. The reverend stumbles backward, Bible falling from nerveless fingers. The coughing man, no longer coughing but snarling, growling, tears at the usher’s throat with bloody teeth.
Is this my fault? For wishing?
Whatever is happening, whatever nightmare is unfolding in that church, has freed me from a promise I never wanted to make.
God forgive me, but some small, selfish part of me is glad.