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When I didn’t answer, my mom let out a sigh and turned away from me, leaving me to myself as she exited the backroom and returned to the crowd outside.
I hadn’t known it at the time, but she was telling everyone that the artist of the popular piece in question was her daughter. For the first time ever, she was proud of my work, of me. It had only taken her seventeen years to show it—and she didn’t even show it to me.
That night, everything changed. My mom met a handsome potential buyer, and they hit it off. They started to date. When my mom wasn’t working, she was going out with Alistair Montgomery, someone who, she claimed, could get us out of our apartment and give us the life she so desperately wanted.
Meaning he was rich.
A year later, my mom was uprooting me halfway through my senior year of high school because, get this, she and Alistair Montgomery were gettingmarried.
And that brought us to today.
Chapter One – Brianna
I couldn’t believe my mom was getting married again. You’d think after how much she bitched out my dad constantly after their marriage collapsed, she wouldn’t want to tie the knot again. Guess my mom was an optimist after all.
Of course, I wasn’t stupid. I knew she was only marrying Alistair for his money. When they’d gotten serious, I’d looked him up, and what I found was a picture-perfect man in his mid-thirties who happened to own multiple businesses—grocery stores, gas stations, restaurants.
His father had been a CEO at some Fortune 500 company who’d died about twenty years ago, leaving him and his sibling with all the money. They’d pulled out of the company, sold their shares off, and pretty much bought what was the town of Eastcreek, a place so small it wasn’t even on the map.
Okay, that was an exaggeration, but it was pretty close to reality.
He was younger than my mom by five years, and that only made my mom giddier. Landing a younger man, she had been so annoying about it lately. A younger, rich man who, I hated to say, wasn’t exactly ugly.
He was hot for an older guy, all right? I had eyes. I could appreciate him, objectively… at least until he became my stepfather—which was today, unfortunately.
I’d met him once, at the rehearsal. He’d seemed nice enough, if a bit stuffy, like most people with money, but that’s what drove my mom crazy. A handsome man with money; it was all she’d ever asked for, all she’d ever wanted. A step up from my dad.
I sat in a parlor, watching a crew of five fuss over my mom—another thing she loved. Someone for her hair, someone for her makeup, someone for her dress, and two people coordinating the whole thing.
Mom had written off her side of the family years ago, probably because she didn’t like how they reminded her of where she’d come from, but that didn’t mean this wedding was small. Held in a concert hall in the big city, not too far from her gallery, where she and Alistair first met. Obviously, his family and friends made up most of the hundred-plus people who were arriving now, as the minutes ticked on.
I was her maid of honor. Like me, my mom had no friends, and as much as I’d tried to convince her to not have any maid of honor and let me sit in the audience and watch the wedding instead of having to stand up there with them the whole time, she’d refused to see reason. Besides, Alistair had a son—sort of—and it’d besonice for me to walk down the aisle with him by my side.
Yeah. Not only was I getting a stepfather who was loaded, but I was also get a snotty stepbrother who just happened to be my age. Hadn’t met him, since he’d skipped the rehearsal, so I got to look forward to that bit today.
Yay.
His name was Gareth, and he wasn’t really Alistair’s son. He was his sister’s son, who Alistair had taken in after his sister had died—the reason Alistair had the entire family fortune to himself.
“Ma’am,” one of the women muttered in awe, taking a step back once she and her crew were done fussing, “you look beautiful. Your to-be will die when he sees you.”
My mom smiled at that, a calculated smile that told me that was exactly what she wanted to hear. She turned around to face me, her brown hair curled and pinned to her head, a veil resting atop with a beautiful tiara attached. Her wedding dress was a bright, vibrant white, more like a gown than a dress. Like she was some princess wedding her true love in a fairy tale.
Alistair had paid for it, of course. It’s the only reason she could afford an extravagant dress like that.
My mom looked at me, waiting to hear praise from my lips, so I got up and said, “She’s right. You look amazing, Mom.” I had to paint a smile on my lips, all the while stretching out my fingers. I’d have to hold onto a bouquet for the entire ceremony. Wasn’t looking forward to that.
No, wait. Technically two of them, because she would hand off her bouquet to me after we got situated near the altar.
“Thank you, honey,” she spoke, sounding quite happy.
The wedding coordinator listened to something in her earpiece, and then her eyes flicked to me. She went to grab my bouquet off an end table. “You. I want to get you in position before we bring your mom out.” She said not a word more, turning on her heel and exiting the parlor room, expecting me to follow her.
This would be the last time I saw my mom before she walked down the aisle. Because words of comfort weren’t my thing, I told her, “Break a leg.” And then I scurried after the woman.
Mom had picked out my dress, too. It was a rather tight red number. It clung to my body, tight around the chest and stomach, loosening up only around the hips. No sequins or anything special to it. I wore a diamond necklace that had suddenly found its way into my bedroom last week with a note labeledfor the wedding. My feet wore three-inch heels that matched the hue of the dress; something I wasn’t used to.
I caught up to the woman, who’d started to walk down the hall without checking whether or not I was behind her. She walked quickly, with a purpose—and because she wore flats and not heels—and she was busy saying, “Once I give the signal, you and the groomsman will come together. You’ll link your arm through his, and together, you’ll walk up the aisle, separating when you’re about three feet away from the minister.”
