The Wedding She Survived novel · Chapter 11 of 24

Chapter 11: Dinner on Alder Street

Killian's POV

Willa read the receipt twice and put it down flat on the table.

"Mom signs for everything," she said. "It was probably the florist. Or my veil pins."

"At nine-forty on the morning of the wedding."

"Then it was the florist."

"Killian." She looked up at me, tired and flushed in my shirt. "Stop. Please."

"I'm only saying what I see."

"I know you are." She slid the receipt back toward me. "Don't show it to her. Not until you know what it means."

"I won't."

"Promise me."

"I promise," I said.

She kissed me once, quickly, on her way out, and I stood in the doorway with the slip of yellow paper and watched her cross the street.

Two nights later, Maureen asked me to dinner.

She had come over with a pie and said it was time her grandchildren's father ate at their table.

It was a warm, crowded room, with the television off, and the long dining table dragged out from the wall.

Three of her friends from church sat at one end, in cardigans, passing a bowl of green beans.

At the other end were my children.

Poppy had put me between herself and Finn, and Sebastian sat across from me, watching my fork.

"You hold it wrong," Finn said.

"Do I?"

"Like this." He showed me.

I held it his way, and he nodded, satisfied.

Beside him, Willa watched me with her chin on her hand and a small smile she didn't know she was wearing.

I tried to memorize it.

After the pie, Sebastian climbed down from his chair and walked around the table and stood next to me.

"Killian," he said. "Will you check for the monster?"

"Which monster?"

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