Chapter 1
The night before my Dallas wedding, my phone pinged.
I swiped it open, and my breath died in my throat.
A photo of my $18,500 wedding gown, sliced to ribbons. Lace tangled, satin hanging in bloody-looking strips.
Beneath it, one line: Know your place.
My hands shook so hard the phone clattered against the hotel vanity.
I stared at the screen, unblinking, until my eyes burned.
Six months. Six months of double shifts at the diner, of blisters on my feet from standing twelve hours straight, of skipping lunch so I could tuck every extra tip into an envelope marked DRESS.
Daniel had paid the other half, pressing a kiss to my forehead and saying it was the least he could do for the girl who’d turned his world upside down.
I fumbled for my phone, dialing him fast.
Straight to voicemail.
His voice, warm and familiar, echoed through the speaker: “Hey, it’s Daniel. Out with the groomsmen—phone on silent. Talk tomorrow, my love.”
Tomorrow.
I sank onto the edge of the bed, my chest heaving.
Ten minutes later, a sharp knock rapped the door.
I knew who it was before I turned the lock.
Margaret stood there, Daniel’s mother, in a cream silk robe that cost more than my first car, diamond studs glinting in her ears. A smirk tugged at her red-painted lips, like she’d already won.
She didn’t wait for an invitation. She pushed past me, her perfume thick and cloying, stinking of money and cruelty.
“Took you long enough to check your messages,” she said, glancing around the bridal suite like it was beneath her.
“That gown was a waste. A small-town waitress doesn’t get to wear something that fine when she marries my son. You should be grateful I let you walk down the aisle at all.”
I stepped toward her, my fists clenched so tight my nails bit into my palms.
“I’m telling Daniel. He’ll call this whole thing off when he finds out what you did.”
Margaret laughed. A cold, sharp sound that skittered down my spine.
“Daniel already knows, Olivia. He agreed it was the only way to knock that pride out of you before you join our family.”
My throat closed up.
I thought of the past month. Daniel flinching every time I mentioned the dress. Jokes about how I was “too attached” to my roots. Late nights he said he was working, but I’d heard his mom’s voice in the background.
I’d written it off as wedding stress.
I’d been so stupid.
“Besides,” she said, tossing a crumpled paper onto the bed.
I picked it up.
A hospital bill from Houston. My mom’s name printed across the top, the numbers so high they made my head spin.
“I’ve been paying her ICU bills for six months,” Margaret said, her voice dropping to a venomous whisper. “One call from me, and they pull the plug. You’ll lose her before you even say I do.”
My knees buckled.
My mom was all I had left. My dad had left when I was five, and it had just been the two of us ever since. I couldn’t lose her. Not now. Not ever.
Margaret tossed a dress at my feet. Cheap, wrinkled white fabric, the plastic tag still hanging from the collar.
$99. Walmart.
“Wear this tomorrow,” she said. “Smile for the cameras. Tell everyone you decided to go simple. And if you so much as breathe a word about the real gown? Your mom dies.”
She turned to leave, pausing at the door to glance over her shoulder.
“Be a good girl, Olivia. For your mom’s sake.”
The door clicked shut.
I sank to the floor, sobbing into the scratchy fabric of the cheap dress, until my throat was raw.
Then my phone buzzed.
The ICU nurse’s name lit up the screen.
My blood turned to slush.
“Ms. Carter?” her voice was tight, urgent. “A woman just called claiming to be your mother’s next of kin. She asked us to stop all life support immediately. Said it was your wish.”
I couldn’t breathe.
Margaret wasn’t bluffing.
She was already making good on her threat.
A soft, frantic knock sounded at the door.
I thought it was her. Coming back to gloat, to make sure I’d gotten the message.
I wrenched the door open, ready to scream, and froze.
Hannah stood there. Daniel’s sixteen-year-old sister. Her backpack slung over one shoulder, her cheeks streaked with tears, her phone held out in front of her like a weapon.
“I recorded everything she said to you,” she whispered. “Every word. And I have the bank receipts. She never paid for that gown. She stole the money from Daniel’s trust fund to pay her gambling debts.”
She stepped past me, unzipping her backpack to pull out a garment bag.
The same one I’d left at the boutique a week prior.
“I swapped the dresses before she got here,” she said, unzipping it.
My real gown. Untouched. Perfect. The lace still crisp, the train folded just how I’d left it.
“She cut up a $200 knockoff.”
Before I could say a word, the door slammed open so hard the walls shook.
May you like
Margaret stood in the doorway. Her face white as a sheet, her hands clenched into fists so tight her knuckles glowed.
She’d heard every single word.
