I Filmed My Husband Cheating, So I Married the Brother He Fears novel · Chapter 3 of 32

Chapter 3: Public Only

Colby and Gerald burst into the courthouse wedding and call Nathaniel a murderer; Imogen tears up their gag order, marries him, and he kisses her in front of Colby's phone.

We were married at ten o'clock on Thursday morning in a county office with a fake ficus in the corner.

I wore a plain grey dress that Bridget had lent me, with the hem pinned up.

Bridget stood beside me as my witness, with her phone in her fist and her red hair flattened by the rain.

Nathaniel's driver stood on his side, a broad man in a black coat who looked at the ceiling.

The registrar read the vows in the voice of a woman on her ninth wedding of the day.

"Do you have the ring?" she asked.

Nathaniel took a plain gold band out of his pocket.

It was already worn at the edges.

I looked at it and then at him.

"It was my mother's," he said quietly. "She'd have laughed at all of this."

My hand did not shake when he slid it on.

His did.

It was a small tremor that he stopped almost at once, and I pretended I hadn't seen it.

"By the power vested in me," the registrar began.

The door behind us banged open.

"Stop this," a man said.

Colby came down the aisle between the folding chairs in a navy suit, with his hair combed.

His father walked behind him, with a lawyer on either side.

"Mr. Lathrop," the registrar said, "this is a closed ceremony."

"I'm the groom's brother," Colby said. "And I'm her husband."

"No divorce papers have been filed," Gerald said, in the flat way he said everything. "She is still Mrs. Colby Lathrop."

"I'm not," I said.

"Imogen," Colby said, and now his voice cracked, which was the best performance I had ever seen him give. "Em. Look at me."

I looked at him.

"You're sick. You're angry. I get it. I made mistakes, I'm human. But you cannot do this with him."

"Why not?"

"Because he's a murderer."

The registrar put her pen down.

Bridget made a sound in her throat.

"Four years ago he drove drunk and killed his wife," Colby said.

He turned to the empty chairs and raised his voice.

"He walked away without a charge because our father covered for him."

"I've protected you from him for five years. Ask him."

"I'm not asking him anything," I said.

"Em."

"You told me you had a meeting, Colby. Did you also tell me what was in my bed?"

The two lawyers looked at the floor.

Gerald checked his watch.

"Take your hand off my wife," Nathaniel said.

He had not raised his voice.

I looked down and saw that Colby had taken hold of my wrist, and I hadn't even felt it.

Nathaniel stood a half step behind me, and he did not touch his brother, but Colby let go.

"You'd choose him?" Colby whispered. "Over everyone you've ever known?"

"I choose the man who has never lied to my face."

I heard myself say it, and I knew it was true.

Whatever Nathaniel was, he had told me the price before I signed.

Colby's jaw worked.

He rubbed his left forearm through his sleeve.

One of the lawyers stepped forward and held out a folder.

"Mrs. Lathrop, sign this non-disclosure agreement today, and Mr. Lathrop withdraws every claim against you."

"What does it say about the video?" I asked.

"That it never existed."

I took the folder from his hand and tore it in half, and then in half again.

The pieces dropped on the registrar's desk, and Bridget cheered, once, and covered her mouth.

Gerald looked at the gold band on my finger.

"That was my first wife's ring," he said.

"She was my mother, and she left it to me," Nathaniel said. "You're not in the will."

Gerald turned to the registrar.

"Go on, then. Marry them. Let the board see exactly what kind of man my son is."

"Father," Nathaniel said. It was the first thing he had said to him, I think, in years.

Gerald smiled.

"Four years, and you've found a woman as desperate as you are."

My face went hot.

I opened my mouth, but Nathaniel took my hand.

"Finish it," he told the registrar.

She looked at me.

I nodded.

"By the power vested in me by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania," she said, quickly, "I pronounce you husband and wife."

Then she added, "You may kiss the bride."

Nathaniel looked at me.

There was a question in it, and the lawyers and Gerald and Colby were all watching.

"Public only," I said, under my breath. "That's the rule."

"Then let's be public," he said.

He put one hand under my jaw and bent his head.

I had expected a stage kiss.

His mouth was warm, slow and certain.

When I made a small sound against it, his thumb moved across my cheekbone.

I put my hand against his chest.

His heart was going hard.

That was a fact I would have to explain away later.

He lifted his head an inch and I could still feel his breath.

"Smile," he said against my lips. "He's filming."

I turned my head.

Colby was holding up his phone, and behind it his face had gone completely white.

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