He Made Her His Bride to Punish Me for Jealousy novel · Chapter 2 of 24

Chapter 2: Constance's Parlor

Dawson's grandmother reads the Trust Plan and throws her grandson out when he begs for a noon wedding, then a call from city hall reveals a marriage license signed at St. Brendan's with Dawson's name and Margo's.

Constance Thornbury read the Trust Plan email standing up, with her cane hooked over her arm and her glasses halfway down her nose.

She read all of it, down to the last line, and she did not say a word.

My mother sat in her wheelchair by the fireplace with a blanket over her knees, watching Constance's face.

I was still in my wedding dress, on a hard chair in the front parlor of the Thornbury house on Blackstone Boulevard.

A housekeeper had brought tea, and no one had touched it.

"Margo is copied on every line," Constance said at last.

"She is," I said.

"Who wrote the rules?"

"Dawson told me Margo did. He said she had a gift for knowing how people work."

Constance took off her glasses and folded them with one hand.

"My grandson has never had one idea about how people work," she said. "He took a woman's bad mood for an alarm and rang it for three months."

"Constance," my mother said quietly. "It wasn't a bad mood. Kerry was right."

"I know she was, June."

The front door banged open.

Dawson came down the hall at a run, still in his tuxedo, with his tie pulled loose and his hair standing up.

He stopped in the parlor doorway and looked at me.

"Kerry. Thank God."

"Don't."

"I got here as fast as I could. They won't stop talking about it, the chat is blowing up, you made it look like I did something terrible."

"You put my ring on her finger."

"It was a joke!" He came three steps into the room with both hands out. "It was never going to be real. Tomorrow at noon is real. I booked the church again, it's all paid for, Margo is already calling the florist."

"Margo is calling the florist," I repeated.

"She's helping me fix it."

My mother made a small sound in her throat.

Constance looked at her grandson for a long moment.

"Sit down, Dawson," she said.

"Grandma, I need to talk to Kerry."

"You will sit, and you will answer my questions, and then she can decide whether she wants to hear a word of yours."

He sat on the edge of a chair.

"How many days did Margo give herself?"

"It was only three. Three real days. The anniversary, the surgery day and today."

"You called it three real days. Were there others?"

Dawson stopped.

"She kept a list," he said. "On her phone. Every time Kerry said something about her, Margo would write down the date and what it cost. She said it was so we could track progress."

"What did it cost?" I asked.

"Small things. A day I'd skip a call to you and take hers. A weekend trip I said I had to work for. I told Margo it would stop after the wedding."

I stood up.

I had not planned to. My legs just did it, and the dress was heavy around me.

"You took her calls instead of mine for three months," I said, "and you thought that was teaching me trust."

"I never lied to you!"

"You said you'd be at the hospital."

He had nothing to say to that.

My mother's hand came out from under the blanket and found mine.

"Kerry," Constance said, more gently than I had ever heard her say anything. "Do you want him in this room?"

"No."

"Then he leaves."

"Grandma."

"The car is outside, Dawson. Take it."

He stood slowly. At the door he turned back to me with his eyes bright and wet, and I almost felt something.

"Noon tomorrow," he said. "I'll be there. Please be there. Please."

"I'll be at my mother's house."

He left.

The front door closed, and the quiet it left behind was almost a relief.

Then Constance's phone rang on the side table.

She looked at the screen and frowned. "An old friend at city hall," she said. "She works the Saturday marriage desk."

She answered, listened, and her face changed.

"Say that again."

She listened again, and her eyes came up and went to me.

"Read me the names," she said. "Both of them."

I couldn't hear the other voice, only the shape of it, quick and careful.

Constance put the phone down on the table very slowly.

"That was my friend at the clerk's office," she said. "A marriage license came back from St. Brendan's this afternoon, signed and witnessed, and she has already recorded it."

My mother's grip on my hand tightened.

"The names on it," Constance said, "are Dawson Thornbury and Margo Winslow."

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