Chapter 6: Two Minutes Alone
I didn't move from the door. I could hear the quartet downstairs start another song, the kind they play when they need to fill time, and the low murmur of the ballroom when a hundred people realize the schedule has slipped.
David had stepped back down the hall to give me space. The woman with the baby — her sister, I now knew — stood a few feet away with the infant in pale yellow tucked against her shoulder, patting his back in that automatic rhythm. She wouldn't look at me directly.
A soft knock came from inside the suite. The sister shifted the baby to one arm and tapped twice on the white paneled door.
"Lauren? Two minutes. He's here," she said quietly.
The door eased open from the inside and Lauren appeared in the gap. She wasn't in her dress yet. She had on a white silk robe, her hair done, makeup finished, a pair of flat slippers on her feet. She was holding a small clutch and her phone. When she saw me there in the hallway, her hand froze on the brass backplate.
She hadn't expected me to be that close. Her eyes went first to my face, then down to the white rose on my lapel, then back up. The color drained out of her cheeks.
"Mr. Vance," she whispered. Not my first name. Formal, like she was already putting distance between us.
I kept my hands still at my sides. I didn't step into the doorway. The warm light from her suite spilled across the threshold and cut a bright line across the front of my tuxedo.
"Hey," I said. My voice was lower than I meant it to be. I could hear myself breathing. "Can we have two minutes? Just us?"
Her sister looked between us. "I'll be right out here," she said, and took a half-step back down the hall, bouncing the baby gently. She didn't leave, but she gave us the width of the doorway.
Lauren didn't answer right away. She looked down the hall toward the stairs where the music was coming from, then back at me. She tucked a loose strand of hair behind her ear with a quick, nervous motion.
"We're already five minutes late," she said. "Your mom sent someone up. The coordinator's been texting. If we don't go down now they're going to come up here."
"I know," I said. "I told David to tell them we needed a minute."
She swallowed. Her grip tightened on the door edge, knuckles pale. The half-open door hadn't moved. Neither of us pushed it.
I had rehearsed how to say it without making it sound like an accusation. I kept my eyes on her and kept my voice even.
"I heard you earlier," I said. "Through the door. You said, 'No, I don't love him.'"
Her mouth parted slightly. She didn't deny it. She didn't ask how long I'd been standing there. She just stared at me, and for a second I could see her deciding whether to pretend she hadn't said it.
"Lauren," I said after a beat, "do you want to go downstairs at all today?"
That was the real question. I left it there in the hallway, quiet enough that only she could hear it.
She looked away then, down at her slippers, at the pale carpet inside the suite. She let out a short breath that wasn't quite a laugh.
"The deposit on the ballroom is non-refundable," she said quickly. "And the caterer has already set the plates. My dad flew in from Phoenix yesterday, he took two days off work. Your family is all down there already. If we stop now—" She gestured vaguely toward the stairs. "They've all taken photos. The officiant is on the clock."
It was all logistics. Numbers and schedules and other people's flights. She listed them like she was reading off a checklist, her voice getting faster as she went.
"We sent the programs to print last week," she added. "My mom already gave a speech at the rehearsal dinner about— about us. About how long we've been together."
I nodded once. I didn't interrupt. I let her finish the list.
"And the dress is steamed and hanging. It's—" She glanced back into the room where I could see the white dress hanging against the far wall, covered in plastic. "I can't just not go down."
She hadn't answered what I'd asked. Not really. She'd answered a different question, the one about what would happen if we didn't.
"I get all of that," I said. "I do. But I wasn't asking about the deposits."
She pressed her lips together. Her eyes were bright now but she wasn't crying. She was holding very still, the way people do when they're trying not to shake.
From down the hall, the baby made a small sound and her sister shushed him softly. Lauren glanced over at them, then back at me.
May you like
"If we don't go down in the next two minutes," she said, her voice barely above a whisper, "someone is going to come up those stairs and open this door for us."
She left the door exactly as it was, half-open, light spilling through, neither of us willing to push it closed or pull it wide.
