They Vetoed My Wedding 5 Times I Vetoed Them for Life novel · Chapter 20 of 24

Chapter 20: The Padlock

Delia's POV

By six on Thursday morning, the whole harbor stood in front of the padlock.

It was a new padlock, brass, the size of my fist, on a chain that went twice around the dock gate.

Behind it, every boat in Port Alder sat tied to its post with no way to reach it.

The lobstermen stood in a row with their arms folded and their thermoses steaming.

The bakery woman had brought a tray of rolls.

The old pastor from Rockland had driven over in his bathrobe under a raincoat.

"Twelve boats," the deckhand said. "Twelve families. That's a day's catch gone for every one of them."

"Who has a key?" I said.

"The commission. Your father holds the master."

Theo stood at the gate with both hands on the chain.

He had not said a word since the cottage.

He looked at me, and I nodded, and he let go.

"Everybody stay here," I said. "I'll be back."

The commission meets in the town hall on Water Street, in a room with five chairs behind a long table.

At seven forty-five I was the only one in it.

I sat down in the middle chair, which was Dad's, and put my bag at my feet.

They arrived one at a time.

The first was the retired schoolteacher, in a cardigan, with a library book under her arm.

She stopped in the doorway.

"Delia?"

"Good morning. Do you know about the padlock?"

"What padlock?"

I let the question hang there.

The pharmacist came next, and then the old lobsterman who had sat on the commission for thirty years and could no longer climb the stairs without a stop.

I asked each of them the same thing.

Did you vote last night?

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