Brad met his eyes. “When it comes to Julia, I’m always nervous.”

Chapter 58

“It seems a little early to panic.” Olivia’s voice rang out in the lavender-tinted room, causing six updo’d heads to turn her way.

“Early?” one of the wedding planners said, her over-plucked eyebrows coming to a point in the middle of her lined forehead.

“It’s eleven-thirty,” the other planner said anxiously, as if everyone in the room wasn’t aware of the hour. “The ceremony starts in thirty minutes. And no one knows where she is. A bride, missing from the wedding ...” She started to breathe quickly, in terse gasps, on the verge of what appeared to be a nervous breakdown.

“She cancelled on us for hair and makeup,” Becca said flatly, shooting Olivia a look, their argument already hours in the making.

“Which would make sense if she ...” Olivia shrugged suggestively as the words dropped off.

“If she what?” Becca shot back.

“I’m just saying ...” Olivia said airily, “maybe she changed her mind. Decided she was making a mistake.”

“Making a mistake?” The female linebacker, who worked for Brad, stepped forward, her arms crossing in front of her ample chest. “Making a mistake by getting married? Have you been in the same room with them? Spoken to either one of them in the last year? They were made for each other; I’ve never seen two people more perfectly matched. Not to mention this is Brad-Fucking-De Luca. Women don’t ‘change their mind’ about Brad, they hunt him down like rabid animals.” She snarled the final words, now officially inside of Olivia’s bubble, her teeth bared and claws out.

Olivia wilted slightly, glancing away and studying her fresh manicure. “I’m just saying that we could give it a little more time. You already drove by her house. She’s not home so she’s probably on her way here.”

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“I think we should tell Brad,” Martha spoke from her post at the window.

“No,” the two planners spoke in unison, panic crossing their faces. One stepped forward. “It’s common for brides to flake. It’s better that the groom doesn’t know. It can taint the ceremony for him, or cause a fight right before the wedding.”

The room was silent, her logic making sense. Rebecca nodded. “Brad will lose it if he knows.”

“So what do we do?” Julia’s mother spoke from her seat in the center of the room, her features tight, mouth pinched.

“We wait. We wait for her to show up. She’ll show up,” Becca spoke from the doorway, and it was the last words spoken for a while, no one having a better solution to offer.

Chapter 59

Rebecca knew this was bad. This was beyond bad. She ground into nothing the soft napkin, the one with Brad & Julia perfectly printed, just as she’d wished. It seemed ridiculous that she’d ever cared. Why did napkins matter when a bride was missing? And it didn’t matter what the bimbo in the other room thought. Julia wasn’t flaking out. It was impossible. She wasn’t that kind of girl. And Brad wasn’t the kind of man who got left at the altar. Something was wrong, she could feel it in her gut. She looked at her cell and wondered, for the thirtieth time that day, if she should call Brad.

♦♦♦

Debra Campbell paced, her heels snagging on the carpet when her steps got too hurried.

“Please, dear. Sit.”

“I can’t sit. Something is wrong. I should have known it earlier. Her not returning our calls this morning?”

“She’s always hard to get ahold of by phone.” The man stood, stopping his wife’s journey with firm hands, pulling her over to a loveseat and pushing her down. “Your blood pressure has to be sky high. Please. Panic isn’t helping.”

His touch grounded her, as it always had. She took a trembling breath, reached out and gripped his hand. “She wouldn’t stand him up, would she?” There was hope in the last word. Hope that her daughter was abandoning this marriage. A humorous development, considering she had been thanking her lucky stars just one day prior. Julia had done well. Her new husband was successful. Adored the ground she walked on. Would do anything to make her happy. But now, there were only two possibilities. Something was terribly wrong, or Julia had cold feet. She prayed for the latter.

Her husband held her gaze steadily, more moisture in his eyes than she had seen in quite some time. “I don’t know, Debra. I really don’t know.”

Down the hall, there was the sound of shouting, and she wiped her eyes. “Let’s go back. See if anyone’s heard anything.”

Chapter 60

She was not responding. They had found her on the floor, still tied to the chair, a pool of blood around her head. One man had panicked, calling the man who shouldn’t have been called. And now they stood, in a circle around her body, repeatedly checking for a pulse and untying her limbs. They carried her to a bed, a bed that had already hosted its share of dead bodies, and prayed that hers wouldn’t join the ranks. If she was to die, it was only by his order. Now was not the time, and failure was unacceptable.

♦♦♦

In actuality, I never had a chance to walk down that aisle. It was never in the cards, plans made to remove me from the equation long before I ever tried on wedding dresses, long before invitations were sent. I don’t think dramatics was their intention. Perhaps they thought that snatching me the night before would be enough advance notice to hold the ceremony—to call guests and cancel the event. As it happened, my absence was not discovered in time, and even then, was suspected to be a case of pre-wedding cold feet.

♦♦♦

“Can we panic now?” Rebecca screamed into Olivia’s face, grabbing her shoulders and shaking her roughly, the girl’s thin body shaking like wet spaghetti. “It is time, the guests are seated, and they are about to start the damn music!”

“Stop yelling at me! It’s not my fault she isn’t here!”

“Who called her cell last?” one of the wedding planners asked anxiously.

“I did,” Julia’s mother said, wrapping her sweater tightly around her shoulders. “Her voicemail is full.”

The strands of music almost missed their ears, drifting among the room casually, weaving easily between their strained words. The second planner looked up with a stricken look. “Oh my God. They’re starting.” She fumbled for her sleeve, pushing back the material to reveal a watch face. “Early.” She fled the room, her heels clattering down the hallway.




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