Chapter 8
The bride finally approached.
Her name was Claire, and until that moment, she had believed the seating issue was a minor family preference Nicholas had handled.
Her face now showed she understood it was not minor.
“Nicholas,” she said quietly, “why is your sister seated here?”
Nicholas looked trapped.
“It was a space issue.”
Jenna looked around the ballroom.
There were three empty adult chairs near a distant floral arrangement.
Claire saw them too.
Her expression changed.
Emmett did not speak.
He did not have to.
Nicholas tried again.
“She said she didn’t mind.”
Jenna’s eyes lifted.
“I never said that.”
Claire looked at him.
The wedding did not collapse.
Music did not stop permanently.
No one stormed out.
But something delicate cracked in public.
Nicholas’s ability to control the narrative.
A man at the nearby table whispered, “That’s Stewart’s writer?”
Another replied, “Apparently.”
A woman in a gold dress said, “I thought Nicholas said she was between jobs.”
Jenna heard it.
So did Nicholas.
His face hardened with the special panic of a liar hearing old lies return with witnesses.
Emmett turned slightly toward Jenna.
“Would you like to step outside?”
It was respectful.
Not rescuing.
Offering.
Jenna appreciated that.
But she stayed.
Not because she wanted revenge.
Because leaving too quickly would let Nicholas fill the silence.
She looked at him.
“How many people did you tell I was failing?”
Nicholas’s eyes darted.
Claire inhaled sharply.
May you like
He had no answer that would survive the room.
Read the full story 👉 The bride realized the seating was not an accident, and Nicholas’s old lies about Jenna began surfacing around the ballroom.
