Chapter 1 Sloane
Sloane
Dominic: I can’t wait to marry you.
The message from my future husband slides down onto the screen, momentarily obstructing my view of the picture of Eric and me on our first date.
Unsurprisingly, he’s been on my mind heavy lately.
His face showing up in my dreams, our memories flitting through my thoughts when I’m supposed to be concentrating on last-minute things like finding shapewear that will support my breasts without disrupting the lines of my dress.
Pulling together the details of my second wedding while reminiscing about the relationship that led to the first should have been disturbing, but I’ve found an odd comfort in going through my final days as Sloane Kent with Eric at the forefront of my mind.
A shiver rolls through me at the thought of changing my last name.
Dom doesn’t even know that I decided to do it.
Throughout the entire wedding planning process, he hasn’t uttered one word about it.
If I didn’t know him as well as I do, I’d think that his silence was a result of his indifference instead of a hallmark of his patience.
Of his unending reserve of understanding and love so gentle, so pure, it doesn’t even know what it means to rush.
With shaky fingers and blurry eyes that refuse to let the tears burning at their corners fall because it would ruin my makeup, I close out of the photo app and open up our text thread, replying to his message quickly so I don’t have to hear Mama or Mal picking at me for texting the man I’m about to meet at the altar in ten minutes.
Sloane: You won’t have to wait much longer.
Dominic: Good thing, too, because I’m dying to see you in that dress again.
We did our first look in a secluded section of the garden just outside the ceremony space, and, much to my surprise and our photographer Amina’s delight, Dom started crying as soon as I rounded the corner.
I knew today would be emotional for us, especially for him, but somehow, I was still caught off guard by the way the tears gathered in his eyes, turning them dark and stormy, brewing with emotion that he let flow freely.
His tears triggered mine, and after we were done crying and fawning all over each other, I had to rush back to the bridal suite to get my makeup touched up.
I’m trying to formulate a response when Kima, my makeup artist, puts the brush down and steps back to look at her handiwork.
“Perfect,” she says, which sets everyone around us in motion.
Mama rushes to the bedroom door, yelling for everyone to come on because I’m finally ready.
Whispers of excitement and fidgeting hands making last-minute adjustments punctuate our journey from the bridal suite to the venue’s first floor, where I’ll walk down the aisle for the second time.
Clutching my heart in my hands, prepared, once again, to entrust it to a man raised by the woman at my side, nurtured with the one at my back who is making sure my veil is secure.
We’re alone now, in the hallway, standing behind one of those privacy screens meant to hide the bride from everyone’s view.
“There,” Mal says, beaming at me.
“You should go line up now, baby,” Mama whispers.
“I know. Shouldn’t you be heading to your seat too?”
“Probably.” There’s reluctance in her gaze, and it matches the lingering emotion laced around my heart. Like we both know something needs to be said, but neither one of us knows exactly what it is or how to say it.
“Wait, before you go.” Stepping forward, I reach out and take them both by the hand. They turn matching amber eyes on me, both sets laced with concern I dismiss immediately. “I’m okay. I just wanted to say that I love you both.”
Mama’s smile is gentle and kind, filled with understanding as she squeezes my fingers. “We love you too, sweetie.”
“Yeah, of course we do,” Mal adds.
“I know.” I swallow, fighting back tears as I look between them.
“Um, I know I’ve said this already, but I want you two to know how much you mean to me.
How much this family means to me. Even after Eric, you didn’t let me go.
You held on tighter. You pulled me closer.
You kept me together until I was ready for this second chance with Dom.
Being a Kent has been one of the greatest honors of my life… ”
My voice breaks, and I fight to keep the tears at bay. I don’t know how this feels like saying goodbye when none of us are going anywhere. I guess it’s not so much a goodbye to them as it is to the version of myself that I’ve been for so long.
“Sloane.” Mal shakes her head, understanding dawning over her features. “You’ll always be our family. It doesn’t matter what your last name is.”
“That’s right, baby,” Mama chimes in, using our linked hands to pull me into her warm embrace. “You were ours from the moment you walked through my front door, and we don’t plan on letting you go.”
I sink into her arms, and when Mal joins the hug, I let the reassurance of her added weight ground me. In my heart, I knew taking Dom’s last name wouldn’t change anything for the two women wrapped around me, but it’s always nice to have the reminder. To have the words spoken and not assumed.
“Is there room for one more?” a deep, booming voice I recognize instantly asks from behind us.
Mama and Mal step back, revealing me in all my teary, bridal glory to my father, who’s decked out in a black tuxedo with a black undershirt that makes the gray hairs in his beard and eyebrows all the more evident.
His eyes crinkle at the sides when he sees me, a soft sheen of tears glazing over his deep brown irises.
“Bean.” He steps forward, taking up residence in the space Mama and Mal have created in front of me, and suddenly I’m standing in a circle of love and adoration, fighting against a wave of emotion that will have me back in Kima’s chair if I don’t get it under control.
Mama and Mal drop my hands, and I exchange their hold for the warm, rough palms of my father, basking in the glow of his proud stare that’s sometimes still laced with regret.
He hasn’t quite forgiven himself for the years of abuse I suffered at the hands of his wife, for the time he spent locked in an internal battle between his love for her and for me.
I still don’t know how to feel about my childhood dream of having Lauren Carson out of my life for good become a reality, but I’m glad I’m not on the other side of it alone.
“Dad, don’t cry,” I order in a shaky voice.
He clears his throat, trying to expel the emotions I can read clear as day. “I’m not crying. I just got a little something in my eye, is all.”
“Stop the lies, Mark,” Mama says, dangling a tissue between us with a laugh. Dad takes it, but instead of wiping his eyes, he folds it into a neat little triangle and hands it to me.
“Okay, Mark, we see you with the cry-angle.”
Mal’s comment makes all of us laugh, and it’s enough to dispel the happy but heavy cloud of emotion that was just swirling around us.
I dab at the corners of my eyes, thankful that Amina has been standing off to the side this whole time, capturing the exchange.
I wouldn’t have wanted anyone else behind the lens today.
She’s been with me the entire day while the rest of her team has shared the task of capturing Dom’s side of the wedding party and the ceremony space.
They’ll come together during the ceremony and reception, shooting from every angle to ensure they don’t miss a thing.
Somewhere in the mix will be her husband, Jax, trying to manage the catering team and his unruly, and very pregnant, wife at the same time.
Mama’s sister Mary pokes her head around the privacy screen. “Annette, Mallory, it’s time to line up.”
Their acknowledgment of her warning is punctuated by clicking heels and chaste kisses to my cheek before they disappear around the corner, a blur of sage and champagne-colored fabric.
Dad links his arm through mine, securing our connection with the solid weight of his left hand, where he no longer wears a ring. Silently, I study the band of skin, digesting the meaning of every degree of difference between the melanin on it and the rest of his finger.
Decades.
He wore it for decades. A symbol of his commitment to her, to the institution Dom and I are about to enter into.
I wonder if it feels like a mockery, walking me down the aisle for a second time, knowing what he knows about how things fall apart.
About how the weight of a metal band and the clarity of diamonds don’t provide any reassurances about what will happen once you put them on.
“Are you doing okay, Daddy?” The question spills out of my mouth, a nervous, blundering, meshing of syllables that causes his brows to pull together.
“I’ve never been better, Sloane.” He shifts, angling his body toward me. “Why are you asking?”
“You’re not wearing your ring.”
A brief glance at the spot my eyes can’t leave and an awkward chuckle serve as his response, holding the space of words I think might be too painful for him to speak.
He misses her. I can tell. It doesn’t make me as angry as I thought it would.
Probably because his missing her is a mark of her absence.
I’ve never had to watch him miss her before.
Usually, it’s me, longing for the person I thought existed in the depths of her scorched soul.
I can only imagine it’s worse for him though.
Because the woman I missed was never real, and the one he’s grieving—for all her flaws and shortcomings—was.
“No. I—uh, I took it off last night. Didn’t feel right putting it back on.”
“Because of me?”