Chapter 5

Chapter 5

Elsie

If someone had told me a week ago that I would be getting married today, I would have laughed.

If they had told me it would be to a man old enough to be my grandfather, I would have thrown something at them.

Yet here I am, standing at the back of the church in a white dress that doesn’t belong to me, about to walk down the aisle to marry Aldric.

The church is full.

I don’t recognize most of the faces. They belong to Aldric’s world—his associates and his acquaintances. They sit in the rows, dressed well, holding their programs as they murmur quietly to one another.

When I step into the aisle, the murmuring softens and heads turn, every eye in the church is suddenly on me.

My father’s hand rests on my arm.

I keep my eyes on the aisle.

At the end of it, Aldric waits in a dark suit. His silver hair is perfectly arranged, his hands clasped neatly in front of him. His face is set into something meant to look warm but it doesn’t reach his eyes.

He watches me the whole way down the aisle.

I look away from his face and focus on the candles on the altar instead.

One. Two. Three.

My father’s hand tightens slightly on my arm as if to tell me to keep walking, which I do.

The roses lining the aisle blur at the edges of my vision, and the organ swells somewhere above us, filling the church with a slow, heavy sound that seems to push me forward step by step.

I reach the altar at last.

My father lifts my veil and kisses my cheek dryly as he ignores my eyes. Then he steps back and takes his seat beside my mother, who is wearing blue and holding a small bouquet as if this day were her own long-awaited event.

Aldric takes my hand. His fingers are cool. When he closes around mine, my stomach flips with the familiar, slow-turning nausea I’ve come to know over these weeks—a feeling of irritation and disgust. I fix my gaze somewhere in the middle distance. The priest opens his book. The church settles into the tense quiet of two hundred people holding their breath.

The priest steps forward, book in hand, his voice even and steady as it fills the church. “We are gathered here in the sight of God to witness the joining of two lives. Marriage is a covenant, a sacred promise of loyalty, care, and love. It is not entered lightly, for it binds the hearts, hands, and souls of those who stand before us today.”

He pauses, looking around, and then continues his rehearsed speech about honor, devotion and the responsibilities of partnership. Around me, the congregation listens, murmuring the occasional ‘Amen,’ but I hear none of it. Today, the words feel like locks clicking shut, sealing me into a glided cage.

I stand at the altar in my ivory dress, trying not to think, because if I did, all I’d do is blame myself and think of solutions that will no longer help me.

Aldric’s thumb moves across my knuckles, and I let my mind go blank, trying to look for even just one thread of control that I might still have over my life.

The priest turns to us. He looks at Aldric first, then me, his expression even and professional. He draws in a breath to begin the vows.

“Do you take—”

The first shot splits the world in half.

Four more shots follow, each one faster than the last. Aldric’s hand leaves mine. I don’t realize why until he collapses to the ground, the white runner darkened beneath him.

The screaming starts.

From everywhere at once—pews, doorway, balcony—the sound is raw, animal. Beneath it, the movement of bodies, people standing, clutching each other, programs and flowers falling. The priest presses against the altar, his mouth open, voice gone.

Then the doors swing open.

Men come in from both sides, moving with the precision of people who have done this before. Their steps are quiet and weapons hang at their sides.

The crowd stiffens, every eye tracking them, every breath held. Programs slip from hands. Someone cries out, quickly hushed by the presence of command.

One of the men steps forward, his movements calm… almost casual. And then he speaks in a flat manner like this was just another usual day for him, “Sit down. No one moves.”

The screaming stops. The church falls into a tense, watchful quiet. Everyone is frozen and waiting to see what happens next.

I stand at the altar. My dress is covered in blood. I stare at it for a moment before forcing myself to look back up.

And then he’s there, in the doorway. My breath catches.My chest tightens and my fingers curl into my palms. I can’t move. I can’t speak. The chaos around him—the bodies, the screams, the panic—feels distant, like it’s happening somewhere else. All that exists is him, stepping forward with a control that chills me to the bone. My mind struggles to catch up, but it can’t. I’m frozen, caught between fear and recognition

He walks as I remember, unconcerned with the chaos, the body, the gun in his hand that still drifts a thin thread of smoke. His suit is dark, his face calm, and he moves with a composure that chills me.

People shift away instinctively, just as they did at Hargrove’s estate, but this time I understand why.

He reaches the altar. He steps over Aldric without a glance, without hesitation, and stops in front of me. His eyes are dark, assessing, precise. Something underneath the sharp look makes my skin crawl beneath the ivory.

His gaze drops for a fraction, to the place below my waist, to the unnoticeable baby bump there. Then it returns to my face, and his face relaxes.

He turns to the priest, who trembles against the altar, book clutched like a shield. He says quietly, his voice slicing through the silence, “Continue.”

Then he looks back at me very calmly, his steely eyes relaxing a bit as he tucks his smoking gun back into his waistband. And then he says, softly enough for only I to hear it; “I’ve been searching for you, mother of my child,”