Page 6 of Revenge

The priest didn’t arrive. Or Jake’s sister, my bitchy maid of honor, sprained her ankle or something. Whatever it is, at least she can’t pin it on me.

“Bea, leave us for a minute,” my mom commands.

“Of course, Mrs. King. I was about to go find something for Dahlia to eat.” Bea rolls her eyes at me as she passes behind my mom’s back and blows me a kiss.

I know something’s really wrong when my mom doesn’t tell Bea I can’t eat because my stomach will pooch in the wedding dress.

“Listen to me, Dahlia.” My mom grabs my bare shoulders and squeezes so hard I try to pull away. She shakes me.

“Mom, you’re going to leave marks!” I exclaim. I can’t imagine she’d want her precious daughter’s snowy-white shoulders to have red blotches when she walks down the aisle.

“Listen to me.”

Something about her tone startles me out of my irritability. I’ve never heard her speak this way. She’s always so controlled and ladylike. Even when she’s throwing daggers.

I go still. “What is it? Is it Daddy?”

My dad is overweight and stressed. Total heart attack material.

“No. Yes. Listen!”

My voice raises in pitch. “I’m listening, Mom. Tell me what’s going on.”

“You’re going to walk down that aisle, and you’re going to marry the man at the altar.”

I blink. Well, obviously.

Has my mother taken too much Valium?

“And?”

My mother shakes her head urgently.

Clearly, there’s something I’m not understanding.

Bea knocks on the door and pops her head in. “You two, it’s time! Everyone’s waiting.”

“You’ll marry the man at the altar,” my mom repeats, as if those words hold deep meaning.

“That’s the plan,” I say with false brightness. Jake Reese, my intended from the time I was thirteen years old.

A man I neither love nor even really admire. He’s a pompous ass who only cares about himself.

I flash a bewildered look at Bea, who holds my giant peach and white rose bouquet out to me.

She shrugs. “Show time.” She picks up the train of my gown, so I can walk ahead of her.

“Promise me,” my mom calls out behind us. “Promise me you’ll do it.”

What in the actual fuck is going on?

It doesn’t matter. I don’t have time to deal with her histrionics this afternoon.

“I’m doing it right now, Mom.” I don’t turn around. We arrived at the doors to the cathedral nave where the rest of the wedding party waits.

My mom takes the arm of one of the groomsmen. “All of our lives depend on it,” she hisses at me just before she enters.

“Jesus H. Christ. Did she get into the liquor cabinet?” Bea whispers.