My Husband Exiled Me to the Ranch of My Dreams novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: The Toast

At four o'clock on Saturday, I sat at my grandfather's table with a laptop and a cup of coffee going cold.

Jed sat beside me with his boots off and the dog across his feet.

The livestream opened on a hotel ballroom in Boise, with white chairs in rows and a long arch of roses.

Sierra stood at the end of the aisle in her mother's cream silk.

Curtis walked her down it, gray in the face and looking at nothing.

Dina sat in the front row in champagne satin, smiling for the camera.

Tanner and the youngest sat two rows behind her, in borrowed clothes.

The youngest was looking straight into the camera on the aisle, though she could not have known I was on the other end.

"Hi, kiddo," I said out loud.

Jed put his hand over mine.

The ceremony took twenty minutes.

Sierra said her vows in a clear, shaking voice, and the groom, a big, soft-faced boy in a gray suit, cried through his.

At the reception, the glasses came out.

Curtis gave a toast about family that ran three sentences and ended in a cough.

Dina gave a longer one, about second chances.

The room applauded her.

Then Sierra stood up with a microphone in her hand.

"I have a toast too," she said.

Her voice was thin.

Her husband of two hours put a hand on her back.

"Everyone here knows my mother came home this summer. Everyone has been so kind to her."

Dina inclined her head.

"I want to thank someone who isn't here." Sierra took a breath. "Her name is Audra Dunning. She raised me from the time I was twelve years old. She sat in a hospital for nine days when I had my surgery. She made my lunches, and signed my permission slips, and she taught me to say no to a boy."

The room had gone quiet.

"I stood on a lawn and said nothing while she was erased. My brothers said nothing. My sister said nothing."

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