Chapter 1

I'd booked a candlelit dinner for two, well in advance.

The waiter looked at the three of us and hesitated, then asked if we'd like to move to a bigger table.

Before I could answer, Janice Pruitt cut in with a smile.

"No need, the three of us are super close! We'll just squeeze in together."

Lewis Henson turned to her almost automatically and smiled.

"Yeah, let's squeeze in. Janice is so thin, she doesn't take up any room like you do."

They went back and forth like that, perfectly in sync.

I sat across from them, like an outsider who didn't belong.

I'd lost count of how many times a scene like this had played out.

All at once I felt tired.

This time, I didn't want to squeeze in with them anymore.

1

Janice, in a little white dress, hooked her arm through Lewis's, beaming.

She lowered her voice. "Celeste Swanson, I'm so sorry, I'm crashing your anniversary again."

Her mouth said sorry, but there wasn't a trace of guilt in her eyes.

Lewis shifted to shield her without thinking, his gaze soft.

"It's not your fault. I'm the one who insisted on bringing you."

From start to finish, his eyes stayed on Janice. He never once looked up at me.

Not long after, a video call came in from Lewis's older sister, Myra Henson.

Once it connected, Myra never mentioned me the entire time.

She fussed over Janice, warm and full of concern.

"Janice, out with Lewis again? Make sure you eat plenty of what you like. Come by the house more often, the whole family adores you!"

The call ended, and Lewis put a couple of pieces of food onto Janice's plate.

Then, as if something had suddenly occurred to him, he remembered me sitting across the table.

He looked up and spoke to me, flat and offhand.

"Celeste, get that custom pale blue dress out of your closet and lend it to Janice."

I asked, confused, "Lend it for what? That's my wedding toast dress."

That toast dress was custom-made for me last month. I'd gone all over the city, store to store, to get it done.

Lewis said it like it was nothing.

"Janice has an important industry dinner coming up and she's suddenly short a dress that fits. There's nothing suitable anywhere in the city."

"Just lend her yours for one night. Afterward I'll have it dry-cleaned and sent to you, good as new. It won't get in the way of your wedding at all."

I said, loudly, at once, "No."

"A wedding dress belongs to the couple. The whole point is that it's for one person, one heart."

"There's no lending it out, no wearing it secondhand."

The moment I finished, Lewis's face went cold, his eyes full of impatience.

"Celeste, can you not be so rigid and dramatic? What century is this? Why are you clinging to this superstitious nonsense?"

"It's not superstition. It's my dress to begin with, and I'm not lending it."

I stared at him, my breathing a little uneven.

"I only get married once in my life. This is my wedding dress. Why should Janice get to borrow it first just to look good in front of a crowd?"

Lewis frowned. "It's just a dress. One night. What difference does it make?"

"You have to dig in over something this small? That's blowing it way out of proportion. Petty."

"Janice only came to me because she had no other option. Can't you be a little bigger than this?"

It was absurd.

To him, the toast dress I'd spent over a month running around for was just an ordinary piece of clothing he could hand off to anyone.

One last-minute dinner for Janice, one he couldn't solve after combing the whole city, and he'd even ask his own fiancée to give up her wedding dress.

Utterly ridiculous.

I clenched my fists tight and, in the end, didn't give in.

Seeing that I wouldn't budge, Lewis lost his patience.

"Fine. Forget it, then."

He saw my furrowed brow, my blank face, and said coldly:

"What's with the cold face again? Killing the mood, aren't you?"

I asked him calmly:

"You bring another woman along to every date the two of us have. Do you think that's appropriate?"

He blanked for a second, then gave a cold laugh.

"Janice and I grew up together. We're just like brother and sister. Can you stop reading into everything, being so petty?"

I laughed coldly.

Last month, when my period cramps were so bad I curled up in bed in a cold sweat, I begged him to buy me a cup of hot ginger tea.

He shook my hand off, face full of disgust, and called me a drama queen.

But when Janice mentioned in the middle of the night, offhand, that she wanted the roasted candied chestnuts from the street stall,

he'd get in the car without a word, even in a downpour, and drive the whole street just to make her happy.

All his tenderness, all his understanding, he'd never spared any of it for me.

For the rest of the meal, I didn't say another word.

Back at the apartment, the night was deep.

I stood alone on the balcony and called my best friend, Anne Fox.

The line connected.

"Anne, I've decided."

"I'm coming to Southport with you to open the studio."

Anne could hardly believe it.

"Celeste, are you sure? Aren't you getting married any minute now?"

I looked up at the pitch-black sky.

"I'm sure."

"Hold my share of the studio for me. I can leave anytime."

This crowded relationship, I'm out.