They Mocked My Curves, So I Married the Billionaire Bartender novel · Chapter 17 of 24

Chapter 17: What the Markers Cost

Gerald swayed in the front pew.

"Monday," he said.

"Monday," Spencer's father agreed, and the church doors shut behind him.

Guests were standing.

Phones were out.

A woman in the fourth row was filming without even pretending not to.

I thought, good.

I unplugged my phone and walked down the three altar steps.

Grayson was already on his feet.

He came into the aisle and stopped in front of me with his hands open at his sides.

"Roz."

"Grayson."

"I said I'd do it where people could see."

"You did."

He turned to face the pews.

Three hundred people stared at the Abbott heir in his dark suit with his tie slightly crooked.

I have never seen my brother look so small, and I have never respected him more.

"I need to say something," he said. His voice cracked and came back. "At the Rhodes gala, I walked onto that stage with a card. It said my sister was a size eighteen. I wrote it to make you laugh."

A few people looked at their shoes.

"Some of you did laugh. I wasn't joking. I wanted to hurt her, because a magazine put her on a cover instead of someone I thought deserved it. I told myself it was a joke. It wasn't a joke. I was cruel to my own sister in front of a room."

He turned to me.

"Roz, I'm sorry. For the card. For the toast. For every time I let Dad say you were the family's problem, and I thought it was funny."

I waited.

"I'm in debt," he said, quietly, to me and the whole church. "I gamble. I'm not good at it. Camille found out last year and said she'd keep it quiet if I did what she said. I did. That's on me."

Someone in the back whispered, "Poor guy."

I did not say that was okay.

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