3: 3

My chest went tight.

Back when our relationship had settled into something steady, I told him the truth about who I was: the eldest daughter of the Sullivan shipping family. I brought him home to meet my father.

I never expected that one meeting would be enough. My father dug in without room for argument and forced us to break up.

"Gail, this poor nobody isn't good enough."

For his sake, I stiffened my neck and fell out with my father. We hadn't spoken in years.

After I built his account into a following that made him an online-famous vet, he never once brought up going back to see my father again.

I assumed he was waiting until he'd grown a little bigger before facing him.

I never imagined he'd been nursing the grudge the whole time.

Worse, now he was using it as leverage against me.

Because no family stood behind me, I deserved to be brushed aside. I deserved to be bullied on my own wedding day.

Something cold slid down my face. I wiped it away without thinking.

On the screen, Carrie sneered along with him.

"The Sullivan shipping family, my foot. No word in years. For all we know she made the whole thing up!"

"She's just an orphan girl. She's the one reaching above her station for my Warren. It's only because my son's soft-hearted, holding on to old feelings, that he'd even marry an old maid like her."

The groomsmen nodded and chimed in.

Mercedes charged over and planted herself in front of me.

"Warren! Have some conscience when you talk! Your whole account was built by Gigi!"

"Who do you think Gigi gave all that up for? She walked away from being an heiress to eat bitter with you!"

Nanette squeezed forward, her eyes curving into a smile on the screen.

"You never eat bitter with Warren. It's nothing but sweetness with him!"

Mercedes shot her a glare and said nothing.

When they saw me still trying to reach the changing room, they actually put their hands on me. In the scuffle I was shoved to the floor, part of my skirt trampled underfoot. I only managed to cover my chest, and my knee split open in a wide raw patch.

Two groomsmen pinned Mercedes's arms, one on each side, and someone had already started reaching for the hem of her dress.

My eyes felt like they'd tear at the corners. Sitting on the floor, I broke and cried out.

"No!"

"Enough! I won't change my clothes!"

"I'll wait quietly for the ceremony!"

Watching how wretched I looked, something flickered across Warren's face on the screen, close to reluctance, before he hardened his heart again in an instant.

"See, isn't that better? Be good, and wait for me to get back."

I was shaking with rage. I didn't answer him. I turned and helped Mercedes over, and we held each other up as we sat down. I couldn't stop apologizing to her. Her eyes were red and her hands trembled as she hugged me back and told me it was fine, and hearing that only broke me more.

For the first time in my life, I began to hate someone.

He could stop loving me. I'd made the bet and I'd lose it and live with that.

But he had no right to treat my friend like this, to treat my cat like this. How dare he.

Two groomsmen were left to watch us. Carrie and the rest went off to see to other things.

The makeup artist came over on her own to straighten our gowns. I held Mercedes's hand and told her with a look that this was not over.

About ten minutes later, my phone buzzed once.

The surveillance footage from the lounge and the makeup room had just landed in my hands.

You don't build Warren into the most popular online vet in the country without knowing a few tricks. Quietly gathering material was one of them.

To collect more footage for the wedding videos, so I could grow Warren's following, I'd made a point of sponsoring the hotel with free ultra-high-definition 4K cameras, and I'd gotten the manager's blessing to pull my wedding-day surveillance anytime I wanted.

I never thought it would become my trump card for proving I'd done nothing wrong.

……

4: 4

An hour passed, and Warren still hadn't come back.

Guests in the ballroom kept asking what was going on, laughing that the bride's family clearly had no manners, showing up late to their own wedding.

Nanette posted to her social media feed and tagged me.

It was a girlfriend's-eye photo of Warren holding the kitten, examining it.

The caption read: 【What a lucky little baby. The second he heard the kitty was sick, kitty's daddy dropped his own wedding and rushed over.】

Warren commented: "Of course I did. Or someone would start crying again."

Below it, a row of comments from the groomsmen: "Warren really spoils her."

Reading the feed, I felt, strangely, no more ache. I even tapped a like with a blank face.

Two hours passed, and Warren still hadn't come back.

Plenty of guests had grown restless and left their seats, and the media friends who'd come to shoot photos and video were already starting to record the bad impression.

I used to be the one who managed all these relationships for him, tending them carefully.

Now I sat in the dressing room, waiting at my leisure.

Carrie came into the dressing room ten times, wound tight,

opened her mouth to say something and swallowed it every time, then went back out.

Two and a half hours, and Warren finally made it back.

Seeing me still in my wedding dress, sitting there perfectly fine,

he let out a breath without thinking,

then rounded on me for not going out front to soothe the guests.

I shot him a look and said nothing.

All at once he felt a flicker of panic,

as if something were slipping past what he could control,

"You did terribly today. As punishment, you won't be handling my account anymore."

"Everything you were in charge of will be handed over to Nanette from now on."

"If you behave through the rest of the wedding, there might still be room to reconsider."

I still ignored him.

Seeing that I wasn't begging him, nervous and desperate the way I always had been, Warren's eyes narrowed in surprise.

Nanette had already nodded, her face flushed.

"Warren, I'll do it even better than Gail did."

Then she rose onto her toes, tilted her face up, and pressed a kiss to the corner of Warren's mouth.

Warren, caught off guard, didn't pull away. And when he saw I still had no reaction, it only made him angrier.

My phone buzzed with an incoming text,

and there, startlingly, was that number I knew by heart and had never once dialed.

Some instinct told me at once: Mercedes had made the decision for me.

I stared at it for three seconds, then opened the message.

"You little brat! More stubborn than your old man! Would swallowing your pride cost you a pound of flesh?"

"Anyway. Wait for your old man. I'm coming by private jet. Ten minutes out from the venue."

Reading the words,

I could almost see the old man standing beside me,

scolding me with a laugh, full of that booming energy of his.

I bit down hard on my lip to keep from sobbing aloud,

but the tears came with no warning, falling one after another like beads off a snapped string.

I hadn't cried when I caught Warren pushing back the wedding to treat his childhood friend's cat.

I hadn't cried when Warren used Hudson's life to force me to go through with it.

I hadn't cried when everyone sneered that I had no family behind me.

Now I couldn't stop the tears at all.

Warren only knew my father had ignored me for years,

but he had no idea why,

that it was because, to make my family accept him, I'd made a bet with my father,

that I couldn't go home and couldn't use my family's connections.

Seeing me cry, the panic that had gripped Warren steadied instead.

He thought I'd finally caved,

so he stepped up and gently wiped my tears,

opening his mouth with grand magnanimity.

"Good, so you do know to be afraid. When the ceremony starts, apologize to the guests properly."

"Just say your family came late and held up the wedding. My account goes back to you after that."

I gave a soft laugh, shook off his hand,

closed my eyes and wiped the tears from my own face,

and when I opened them again, everything was clear.

Up front, the officiant was calling for the bride and groom to take their places.

I lifted my skirt and walked toward the front hall, steady on my feet.

Warren called after me to wait. I didn't look back.

At the entrance to the hall,

the man stood waiting at the door, towering as a mountain, as dependable as he'd always been in my memory.

Seeing me look over, he gave me a nod from across the room.

And Warren, coming up behind me,

went white the instant he saw who it was,

a cold wave shooting up his spine straight to the crown of his head.

"……"