My Groom Walked Out, So His Brother Took His Place novel · Chapter 26 of 32

Chapter 26: The Dock

Jude's POV

I had been on the dock since six in the morning.

The lake was gray and flat under a low sky.

I'd brought a thermos and a sleeping bag and nothing to do with my hands.

At noon, I looked at my watch.

At ten past, I thought, he's saying it.

At twenty past, I thought, she's listening.

I watched a heron stand in the reeds for two hours without moving.

I knew what I'd done.

I had left the church to her, because I wanted it to be hers.

I had told myself it was kindness.

Standing in that lot with a paper bag, I had known it was also a way of not being in the room when she said his name.

At about three, I heard tires on the gravel.

I didn't move.

A truck door slammed.

Boots came down the path, fast, and stopped.

Then the boards of the dock began to ring under running feet.

I stood up.

She stopped ten feet away.

She was out of breath, with her braid half undone and her good green dress dusted gray to the knee.

Her face was red.

She had run, I thought, from the truck, but I thought she had run a lot farther than that.

"You weren't there," Bryn said.

"No."

"I looked for you the whole time," she said.

"I know. Oma said..."

"I don't care what Oma said." Her chest heaved. "He didn't ask me, Jude."

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