Chapter 1 - The Question I Couldn’t Answer Yet
I was already sitting upright in the bridal-suite bed when I heard the handle move.
My name is Audrey Hale.
Thirty-one years old.
Bride for exactly zero minutes.
The champagne-gold satin sheet was wrapped tightly around my body, pulled high against my chest because I had taken off my wedding gown nearly an hour earlier and could not make myself put it back on.
Warm ivory light filled the hotel suite.
The pink-and-white roses Julian had chosen for my bouquet were supposed to be downstairs.
So was I.
Instead, I was staring at the dark wooden bedroom door.
My eyes widened.
I gasped and pulled the same satin sheet higher.
“JULIAN…?”
The door slowly opened.
Julian Cross stood there in his wedding tuxedo.
Black jacket.
White shirt.
Silver-gray vest and tie.
Short dark hair that had been perfectly styled that morning and now looked as if he had been running his hands through it.
He was holding the bouquet.
The same pink-and-white roses.
His eyes were already red.
He had been crying.
He stopped when he saw me.
For several seconds, neither of us moved.
Then Julian started walking into the room.
He held the bouquet so tightly that I could see his knuckles whitening around the stems.
Tears ran down his face.
“I WAITED FOR YOU AT THE ALTAR.”
My throat closed.
I could not answer.
He came closer.
“EVERYONE WATCHED ME STAND THERE ALONE.”
His breathing became heavier.
The flower stems bent beneath his grip.
I wanted to speak.
I had been trying to find words for almost an hour.
But everything I could say sounded impossible.
Julian reached the bedside.
Then anger overtook heartbreak.
In one fast motion, he swung the same bouquet across my face and upper shoulder.
The roses struck me.
Petals exploded across the champagne-colored sheets.
I recoiled sharply but stayed on the bed, one hand clutching the satin sheet against my chest.
No second strike.
Julian stood over me with the crushed bouquet still in his hand.
“You made me look like a fool!”
I stared up at him.
Shock hit before pain.
Not because the flowers seriously injured me.
They didn’t.
Because Julian had never struck me with anything before.
Not once.
He looked horrified by what he had done for half a second.
Then anger returned.
His voice broke.
“WAS ANY OF IT REAL?”
I lifted one hand toward the place where the bouquet had hit.
The room went silent.
Julian waited.
I still did not answer.
Not before that moment ended.
Because the truth was sitting six feet away on the hotel desk inside a white legal envelope.
And once Julian saw what was inside it, the question would no longer be whether I had lied about loving him.
May you like
It would be whether he had ever intended to tell me what he had done with my name before marrying me.
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