One lock-screen message changed everything. I wasn’t looking for drama—I just picked up his iPad. But what I read (and the ‘baby daddy’ attached to it) made me realize my wedding was a setup.
Rain hit the tall windows of Aunt Betty’s Victorian like it had a personal grudge. It did not fall in any soft, poetic way. It attacked. Sheets of it slapped the glass so hard the panes trembled in their frames, and every gust of wind shoved a low groan through the old house like the place was warning me about something I had not yet learned to fear. The storm had rolled over Marin County just before dusk, turning Oak Street into a ribbon of reflective black and filling the gutters with rushing water. Inside, the kitchen glowed gold under the pendant lights. Copper pans hung above the island. Candles waited at the table. The beef Wellington rested on the board in front of me, steaming through its crisp lacquered crust, the smell of butter and mushrooms and thyme so rich it should have meant celebration.
I stood there in one of Aunt Betty’s old aprons, knife in hand, telling myself the knot in my stomach was excitement.
It was our anniversary. Two years since Brett Daniels had dropped to one knee in the town square in Sonoma while tourists clapped and my mother dabbed fake tears from the corners of her eyes as if she had always wanted me happy. I had spent the week pretending I was not the only one planning tonight. I’d bought the Cabernet he liked, the expensive one I usually skipped because I made good money as a pharmacist but not the kind that invited careless spending. I had polished Betty’s silver until it mirrored the candles. I had ironed the linen runner. I had arranged white roses at the center of the table because Brett once told me they made the house look “like real money,” and I had laughed then because I thought he was joking.
