After Being Accused as a Mistress, I Married My Ex's Uncle novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: No Deal

I told Declan where I was going before I went.

That's rule six, and by then I liked saying it.

"Saint Anselm's," I said. "Seven in the morning. Hayden picked it."

"Why there?"

"It's where he stood up and objected at our wedding. He's wanted to take it back ever since."

He drove me and parked across Astor Street without a word.

Before I got out, he reached over and straightened my collar with two fingers.

"Ten minutes," he said.

"A very quiet car."

"A very patient one."

The church was empty, and the candles were out, and the priest's voice floated from somewhere in the vestry.

Hayden sat in the second pew, where he had sat on my wedding day.

He wore yesterday's shirt.

He had not shaved, and the gold watch he was so proud of was missing from his wrist.

"Thank you for coming," he said.

I didn't sit.

"You said you'd say it all."

"I will." He took a folded paper out of his jacket and held it up like a ticket. "This is the paper my father signed. The chair, the voting shares, the wedding date. His signature is on it, and his lawyer's. Take it."

I took it.

It was exactly what he'd said, three pages, with Stanley's name at the bottom in a hand I'd seen on the Tribune's front page.

My heart went hard in my throat.

"Why now?"

"Because I can't breathe." His voice cracked. "I stood at that arch last night saying 'I take thee' to a woman I've never touched, and my father clapped. He clapped, Cora. He's going to give me the company for being his errand boy."

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