Chapter 2: Hot, steamy, intense…

Chapter 2 

Joye

"Play it," I said to the media head standing by the screen.

He hesitated, glancing at my father, who gave a small, confused nod. Then the screen behind the altar flickered to life.

The first thing displayed on the screen was photos, photos of Stephen and Marcus at a hotel bar holding hands too intimately in a way that suggested more than friendship. 

Then a video, dated only three weeks ago, of the two of them laughing together in bed, Stephen's face turned toward the camera, unaware, completely at peace in a way I'd never once seen him with me.

Gasps rippled through the congregation like wind through grass. Someone's chair scraped back, a woman near the front pressed a hand to her mouth.

I reached out and took the microphone from the stunned pastor.

"Good afternoon, everyone," I said, my voice steadier than I felt. "Thank you all for coming today to celebrate what was supposed to be my wedding."

Murmurs and whispers filled the hall. My mother's face, pale as the tablecloths.

"Unfortunately," I continued, "the wedding is canceled."

More gasps erupted through the hall. Someone actually laughed in disbelief.

"I found my fiancé in his room twenty minutes ago, with his best man." I let that sit for a second. "I think the video explains the rest better than I can."

I set the microphone down gently on the altar, like I wasn't about to detonate my entire future in front of two hundred witnesses. I walked back to Stephen, removed my ring and threw it at his face. 

"Joye!"

Stephen's voice chased me through the doors, into the hallway, out toward the parking lot.

"Joye, wait! Please!"

I kept walking.

He caught up with me, grabbing my arm hard enough to spin me around. "Do you have any idea what you just did?"

"I told the truth," I said. "Something you clearly struggle with."

"You humiliated me in front of everyone I know.” He barked at me.

"You humiliated yourself the second you got on your knees for your best man hours before our wedding."

His face twisted desperately. "You think anyone's going to want you now? A woman who canceled her own wedding on the altar? You think men are lining up to marry damaged goods?"

I stared at him, almost impressed by how low he was willing to go.

I could not believe the words I was hearing from the man who was supposed to be begging me. 

"You're going to spend the rest of your life alone," he spat. "No man is going to touch you after this. You'll be a joke. The bride who got left standing there like a fool."

I slapped him.

Hard enough that the sound cracked through the parking lot like a gunshot, hard enough that his head snapped sideways and his hand flew to his cheek.

"Don't you dare," I said, my voice shaking, "talk to me about being a joke, when you're the one who almost married a woman while sleeping with a man."

He stared at me, stunned into silence for the first time all day.

I turned and walked to my car, another round of hot tears threatening to blind me. 

"Joye!" Bella's voice this time, running after me, heels clicking against the pavement. "Joye, wait, don't drive like this, let me come with you…"

I didn't stop. I got in, slammed the door, and pulled out of the parking lot so fast I nearly clipped a valet stand. In the rearview mirror, I watched Bella grow smaller and smaller until she disappeared completely, along with the venue, along with Stephen, and every other thing that reminded me of the failed wedding. 

“What if Stephen is right?” I asked myself aloud as painful tears streamed down my eyes while I laughed out painfully. 

I don't remember deciding where to go. I just simply remember ending up at a bar on the other side of town, one I'd never been to before, one where nobody would recognize the runaway bride from the viral video that was probably already circulating online.

I was still in my wedding dress.

The bartender didn't even blink. He’d probably seen worse than this on an ordinary day. "Rough day?" He asked, beaming at me.

"You have no idea," I said, sliding onto a stool. "Whiskey, please. Keep them coming."

He nodded, and poured into a glass he had placed in front of me.

By the third glass, the edges of the day had softened into almost bearable. By the fifth, I was laughing at nothing, my veil discarded somewhere on the bar counter, my carefully pinned hair falling loose around my shoulders.

Just then, my eyes caught a charming young man.

He was sitting a few stools down, watching me with an expression that wasn't pity and wasn't judgment… something that looked like curiosity, like he was trying to solve a puzzle.

"Rough wedding?" he finally asked, nodding toward my dress.

I laughed, too loud, the sound bitter. "You could say that."

"Groom get cold feet?"

"Groom got someone else's feet tangled with his," I said, and laughed again at my own joke, though it wasn't really funny at all.

He didn't laugh, but something flickered in his eyes. Understanding, maybe. He moved one stool closer.

"I'm sorry," he said, and he actually sounded like he meant it.

"Don't be. I'm not." I looked at him properly for the first time. Dark hair, sharp jaw, the kind of face that looked expensive even in dim bar lighting. "You're the first honest thing that's happened to me all day."

"I haven't said anything yet."

"Exactly," I said. "Honest silence. I'll take it."

He smiled then, and ordered another round for both of us.

I don't remember all the details of what happened after that… the conversation blurred into laughter, laughter blurred into his hand on mine, his hand on mine blurred into the back of a cab, and the back of a cab blurred into a hotel room I didn't recognize, with a man whose name I wasn't sure I'd even properly caught.

I remember blur memories. The taste of his soft lip, his intoxicating scent, the way he fucked me so hard. 

He gradually took off my dress, stroking deep into the deepest part of my honey pot. I moaned out loud. I had never been fucked so hard and passionate all my life. 

Stephen never lasted this long. 

His cock is huge, it kept filling me up, in and out at a very fast pace, our sweat mixing up as we devoured each other’s lips desperately. 

Everything was blurring together, but one thing I knew for sure was that I’d had the greatest sex of my life.