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“Harold?” I ask cautiously.
“He already left.”
Getting to my feet, I grab a clutch bag in which I’ve stuffed my phone, anti-nausea pills, tampons, and tissues. I never go anywhere without tampons and tissues. My period is irregular, often arriving when I’m under more duress than normal.
“Do you have everything?” he asks.
I nod. My single suitcase has been taken to Damian’s house earlier. He sent a driver to collect it.
“Let’s go then,” he says. “Mr. Dalton will skin me alive if we’re late.”
I don’t show Bobby my fear. Fear makes you vulnerable. It makes you an easy victim. I hand him my bag while I fit my shoes.
“I’m ready,” I announce.
I don’t have a choice.
Damian
The bells toll in the stone church tower. It’s a haunting and beautiful sound. Rare. They only use the bells for special occasions because they’re old and fragile. The fact that they’re using them for me tells the witnesses in the church I’m a man to be reckoned with. There’s not a face turned to me without fear. It’s there, in their fake smiles and plastered-on expressions of goodwill. They’re only here to witness the beginning of the fall of the Dalton empire.
One, two, three. The last dong falls like a verdict on four. The sound reverberates through the acoustic interior, carrying on the dubious silence that follows. When the sound dies down, the guests stand, and the organist starts playing. The first notes of The Wedding March fill the space. It’s dramatic and theatrical. I picked it specifically, just like the cascades of white roses and the thick candles burning in golden candelabras on both sides of the aisle. Facing the entrance, I await my bride.
Despite the flamboyance, there’s something in my chest, a tightness that borders on nerves when the doors don’t open immediately. My posture is straight and my face stoic, but my hands ball involuntarily into fists. I only relax slightly when the double doors start swinging inward. A fan of light falls into the shadowed church, letting sun into the somber, cool interior. The beams burst through everywhere, up toward the gallery where the organ is playing and down over the stone floor. They keep on stretching, reaching, until the doors are fully open. It’s blinding. After the darkness inside, I have to blink for my eyes to adjust. Like a revelation, a figure stands in the midst of all that pure white. I almost breathe easier, but not yet. It’s a long walk down the aisle, and an even longer way to saying yes.
Dalton stands next to the door. As the music goes into the second sonata, he offers his arm, but Lina steps past him, as if she doesn’t see him, and then she stops. I don’t have time to ponder the observation, because the sonata is in full swing, and she’s still not moving. My heart beats faster. My breathing speeds up. She’s a silhouette of a shadow, obscured by the light. I can’t make out her face or expression, just that she’s not fucking moving. Dalton goes forward. She trips slightly as he nudges her. I’m about to shoot to the end of the aisle and drag her to the altar by her arm when she finally puts one foot in front of the other.
Something in me lifts, making me feel weightless, but it only lasts a second. The same someone who opened the doors closes them. The daylight is expelled, and the interior is once more basked in a gloomy light. It’s then that I make out her face, her figure, her dress. Her fucking dress. God help me. I fist my hands so hard my knuckles crack. From her fashionable little hat to her elegant shoes, she’s dressed for a funeral. In front of all these people, she makes a mockery of me, coming to me in black.
Chapter 2
Lina
Gasps fill the space. Shocked gazes follow my slow progress, turning sympathetic as they fall on the groom who waits stoically at the altar. They gauge Damian’s reaction. Whispers rise above the organ. Words like lunatic, out of her mind, and sacrilege reach my ears. The stiff notes of the Wedding March, the flowers, the candles, everything befitting of a white dress suddenly seems exactly what it is—a show, and a kitsch one at that.
I try to walk with unfaltering steps, each one bringing me closer to an uncertain and dreaded future. Damian watches me with the intensity of a panther. The calmness with which he studies me is the quiet before his storm. His dark eyes promise retribution, but I don’t think about it. For now, I rejoice in my small victory. It’s the small victories that keep my spirit alive.
A hush falls over the church when I reach the man to whom I’m about to make unthinkable promises. Dressed in a black suit, white shirt, and silver cravat secured with a diamond pin, he looks like a man who belongs in Harold’s world. He’s nothing like the boy I remember. The boy I met had thick hair that needed a cut. The ends brushed the strong column of his neck. The rich, ebony stands made me itch to thread my fingers through them. The neat way in which it’s brushed back now, not a hair out of place, looks stiff. If he was distant on the night I first met him, he now looks unreachable.
