Wedding Eve Goodbye novel · Chapter 21 of 24

Chapter 21: No Promise

Dominic's POV

At a quarter to twelve, the church was full.

I stood at the altar rail in my black suit and counted the pews to keep my hands still.

Two hundred people had come back.

Some had come to see a wedding. Most had come to see a second one fail.

Odile sat in the front pew on the right with her cane across her knees and her chin up.

Mina stood to my left in a grey dress, with her hands knotted together, because Elin had asked her to stand there.

Rhonda sat in the front pew on the left in a black dress and pearls.

Beside her sat a lawyer with a briefcase, and on her other side sat the nurse with the manila folder on her lap.

Rhonda caught my eye and smiled.

I looked away.

At noon the organist finished her prelude, and the doors at the back stayed shut.

A cough ran across the pews.

At five past, someone whispered.

At ten past, a man in the third row said, loudly enough for me to hear it, "Here we go again."

My mouth had gone dry.

I did not blame her.

I had told her a hundred ways that she owed me nothing, and I had meant it.

She could have changed her mind in the dark, in the loft, with her sister asleep beside her.

She could be on a road out of Connecticut, and I would not argue.

I would stand at this rail until the lilies died, and I would not think badly of her once.

"Mr. Haldane," the priest murmured. "Shall we wait?"

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