Chapter 1

While we were planning the wedding, Roy Delgado insisted we split every cost.

He laid his hand flat on the stack of receipts, and his reasoning was airtight.

"Marriage is a two-person thing. It wouldn't be fair for me to carry every expense alone."

I looked at him and didn't argue.

Seven years together. I didn't want it to turn ugly over something like this.

He opened his laptop right away and pulled up a detailed spreadsheet, every number worked out to two decimal places.

With everything laid out, my share came to a hundred and eight thousand, eight hundred.

I paid it, and I thought that was the end of it.

Until the wedding itself, when the officiant reached the vows.

"Mr. Delgado, do you take Miss Henson to be your wife, for richer, for poorer?"

With every eye on him, Roy hesitated a moment, then reached into his pocket and pulled out a handheld calculator.

"The venue just told me they've added two tables at the last minute."

"Thirteen of the guests are from the bride's side, seven from the groom's."

In the silence, the calculator reciting each figure sounded unbearably loud.

Then he held the yellow payment code up in front of my face.

"Split per head, I've fronted four thousand six hundred sixteen dollars and forty-six cents for you."

"Send the money first. We'll pick the ceremony back up after."

When I didn't move, his childhood friend, the self-proclaimed feminism expert, spoke up on his behalf.

"These days it's about equality between men and women. Going Dutch isn't about the money, it's about respect."

The bridesmaid dress she had on cost a hundred and eighty thousand.

Ninety thousand of that had come out of my pocket.

I swallowed the I do sitting in my throat.

Scanned the code, sent the money, clean and quick.

Then I turned around, took out that stack of bills again, and threw it down in front of them.

"Since you love doing the math, let's do it properly."

1.

Something flickered across Roy's face, alarm, and he grabbed my hand and dropped his voice low.

"This is not the time for you to throw a tantrum."

"There are a lot of people watching. Let's finish the wedding first."

His grip was hard, his knuckles grinding into the bone, the pain climbing up my wrist.

So he did know perfectly well what mattered and what could wait.

He'd simply chosen the worst possible moment to humiliate me anyway.

I shook his hand off and gave a cold laugh.

"So when I settle accounts it's a scene, but when you do it, it's just business?"

He frowned, his whole face disapproving.

"That's different."

"We went over the earlier bills together. You signed off on them."

"Dredging all of that up now, if that isn't making a scene, what is it?"

Sophie Swanson stood beside him, holding up the hem of her dress, chin high.

"Roy, she just wants to use the wedding to make a show of herself. Don't indulge her."

"The most important thing for a woman is independence. A leech who only knows how to cling to you and drain you dry doesn't deserve to walk into the Delgado family."

I looked her up and down.

The bridesmaid dress she was wearing cost thirty times what my own gown had.

The day of the fittings, she'd picked this one out at a glance.

Roy had swiped his card without so much as looking.

"Doesn't matter what it costs. What matters is that you like it."

When he handed me that bill, my heart gave a jolt.

"The bridesmaid dress costs more than the bride's gown? Who exactly is getting married here, her or me?"

He'd answered with a careless grunt, only pressing me to sign quickly.

"Now isn't the time to fight over this."

"Sophie loved the style, not the price tag."

"You only get one wedding. Don't be so stubborn over a little money."

My pen hovered over the signature line, and the gowns he'd vetoed flashed through my mind.

"This one's too flashy. We're getting married, not entering a beauty pageant."

"This one's over budget. Practical and affordable is always the safest choice."

Looking and looking, he'd finally settled on a plain, ordinary off-the-shoulder gown.

Tag price, six thousand.

Roy briskly transferred me three thousand, then turned and took Sophie off to pick out jewelry.

"Your dress is grand. You'll need some pieces to carry it."

That night, when we got back, he held the receipt out in front of me.

"The bridesmaid's accessories. Check it over, and if it's fine, give me the money now."

I took it and glanced down, and the zeros after the total in the bottom right corner were too many to count.

The anger in me began to swell.

I threw the receipt back in his face.

"Who exactly are you marrying?"

He rubbed the space between his brows, his eyes scolding me for being childish.

"Sophie went out of her way to make time to be a bridesmaid. Why do you keep nickel-and-diming over this?"

"Darlene Henson, don't be so petty."

I laughed once.

Of everything spent on this whole wedding, less than ten percent had gone toward me.

And now he was blaming me for not being generous enough.

In the end I gave him the money anyway.

I just wanted to see how much he was actually willing to spend on Sophie.

But just now, he hadn't even forgotten to tally the bill in the middle of his own vows.

The calculator reciting each number, every person down there heard it clearly.

Every figure that popped out of it landed like a slap across my face.

Making all my patience up to this point look like nothing but a joke.