Page 105 of Vow

That had never been her thing, or her family’s. She was baptized Protestant as a baby, but the last time Haven remembered stepping inside a church was when she was seven, and her only sibling—a baby boy her parents named Caleb—was laid to rest in a small, pale blue casket after dying from SIDs at only fourteen days old.

Her parents never had more children.

They’d never gone back to church, either.

Haven suspected that was because her parents’ relationship with God had been severely tested from the death of their son. Up until that moment in her life, she remembered spending every Sunday in church sitting between her parents in a pew. But after that? They spent Sundays living.

Because wasn’t that what life was for? The living?

Maybe that was why as an adult, Haven had never found herself drawn to church. God was still on the back of her mind, sure. And maybe that was just her personal way of keeping connected to him in the privacy of her own mind. Prayers that no one knew she was saying, and faith that no one could question.

He knew.

Wasn’t that what counted?

Haven’s awkwardness at standing on the steps of the church could certainly be attributed to her tenuous relationship with organized religion, but that was only a part of it. A lot of it was the fact that she knew the love of her life was about to be married inside this church.

And he was not getting married to her.

She looked no different than any of the other guests rushing up the steps. She was dressed up in the most suitable thing she had been able to pull from one of her suitcases. A pale yellow dress that hugged her curves, and fell just below her knees. Certainly church and wedding appropriate, even for a Catholic ceremony. She used a large similarly colored sun hat that Valeria had left behind when she left to pull off the outfit. Plus, it might keep her face hidden.

Win, win.

If only …

Haven was too late. She didn’t need to be told to know it was true. She could tell by the way the last few guests were rushing up the stairs of the church, and the fact that a car was already waiting at the bottom with painted-white tins tied to the bumper.

If the ceremony had not already started, it would soon.

She was too late.

She thought, maybe, she might get there in enough time to see Andino before all of this took place, but it seemed like she hoped for way too much. And now she was only left heartbroken all over again.

Turning on the stairs, Haven moved to leave altogether. She didn’t need to be there to see her future walk away, too. This was more than enough.

“Late too, are you?” came a familiar voice.

Haven’s gaze lifted to find a hazel-eyed, grinning Marcello standing just a few steps below hers. Andino’s uncle.

Lucian.

“I’m not here for … the wedding,” she said lamely.

Lucian nodded. “I don’t want to be here for it either, frankly.”

Yet, he was.

Like her.

The man tipped his head to the side, and drew a hard puff from the cigarette in his hand. He eyed the cancerous stick with a keen eye. “My wife hates these fucking things, and for the most part, I gave them up years ago. Like a lot of other bad habits. But on days like today, it gets me out of shitty situations that I don’t want to be in for at least ten minutes while I have a smoke. Lucky me, huh?”

Haven blinked. “I should go.”

“Why?” Lucian asked, glancing back at her. “Because you think he’s actually getting married today?”

That lump in her throat was back, and harder than ever. She swore it stuck to her throat like hot, sticky tar. Burning, and refusing to budge no matter how many times she tried to swallow it down.

“Isn’t he?” Haven gestured at the car at the bottom of the steps with the words Just Married painted on the rear windshield, and then waved the invitation in her hand. “I’m too late, I guess. Not that it would matter. I wasn’t what the rest of you wanted for him, anyway.”