Chapter 6 - The Woman in the Front Pew
Camille refused to go.
For eleven minutes.
Then Adrien said, “If Samuel knows something that can stop Margot, we need it.”
“We?”
“Yes.”
“You mean your security team.”
“I mean us.”
“Stop doing that.”
“What?”
“Making it sound like there is an us.”
Adrien became silent.
Camille hated herself for wishing he would argue.
At the cathedral, Samuel sat beneath the enormous stained-glass window where Adrien was supposed to marry Celeste.
He looked exhausted but unharmed.
“You disappeared,” Adrien said.
“I needed Margot to believe I ran.”
“Did she?”
“No.”
Samuel looked at Camille.
“You came.”
“Apparently I make poor decisions while feverish.”
Samuel almost smiled.
Then he handed her a sealed document.
It was dated eighteen years earlier.
Marianne Arden’s signature appeared at the bottom.
Camille sat.
Her mother had created a trust.
Ardan House belonged to it.
Camille was beneficiary.
The lease she had signed was not truly a lease.
It was an activation agreement returning the property to her.
“Why hide that?”
“Marianne wanted you to choose the house without knowing.”
Camille stared.
“My mother planned my life?”
“No. She protected your choice. If you never chose Ardan House, ownership would pass to a foundation.”
Adrien understood.
Nobody had forced Camille there.
She had found it.
Loved it.
Chosen it.
Just as Marianne wanted.
Samuel then explained Margot’s real plan.
The marriage trust would allow her to challenge ownership of assets that had once passed through Viktor’s father.
With forged documents and enough voting control, she could destabilize both families.
“But she needs the wedding,” Camille said.
“Yes.”
Celeste entered behind them.
Everyone turned.
She had heard enough.
“Then there won’t be one.”
Adrien stared at her.
Celeste removed her engagement ring.
Her hand trembled.
“We were already wrong before any of this.”
“Celeste—”
“No. We were comfortable. Compatible. Appropriate.”
She looked at Camille.
“And all year, I watched him look for you whenever you left a room.”
Camille went still.
Adrien said nothing.
Celeste laughed through tears.
“That silence is why I’m ending it.”
She placed the ring in Adrien’s palm.
“I deserve somebody who notices when I leave.”
Adrien closed his fingers around it.
“Yes,” he said quietly. “You do.”
There was pain.
But also relief.
Celeste saw it.
That hurt her.
She turned away.
Camille followed her into the vestibule.
“I’m sorry.”
Celeste looked at her.
“Did anything happen?”
“No.”
“Did you love him?”
Camille could have lied.
She had lied for years.
“Yes.”
Celeste nodded slowly.
“Then do one thing better than I did.”
“What?”
“Stop confusing silence with loyalty.”
She left.
Adrien stood behind Camille.
Neither spoke.
Finally he said, “The wedding is canceled.”
Camille faced him.
“Because of Margot?”
“No.”
The answer frightened her more than yes.
Adrien stepped closer.
“I would have canceled it even if Samuel had walked in here and told me every document was legitimate.”
“Adrien.”
“I spent six years thinking the reason my life worked was because I had chosen the right people.”
His eyes held hers.
“Then I walked into your apartment and realized my life worked because one person had been quietly holding it together.”
“That’s not love.”
“No.”
Her heart sank.
Then he continued.
“That’s the excuse I used to avoid recognizing it.”
Camille stopped breathing.
Adrien moved closer.
“I don’t know when it changed.”
“Don’t.”
“I know I looked at that calendar and the first thing I felt wasn’t anger that my assistant was resigning.”
She whispered, “Stop.”
“It was terror that Camille was leaving.”
Her eyes filled.
He reached toward her.
He did not touch her.
He waited.
Camille stepped backward.
“I won’t be the woman you choose eighteen days before marrying someone else.”
“You aren’t.”
“That’s exactly what I’d be.”
“I canceled the wedding.”
“Ten minutes ago.”
His hand fell.
Camille’s voice broke.
“I have spent six years making your life easier. I will not make this easier too.”
She walked away.
Her phone buzzed before she reached the cathedral doors.
A message from an unknown number.
Congratulations on the canceled wedding.
Another followed.
Now Adrien has made the choice his father made.
Camille stopped.
A photograph loaded.
Viktor Kovac stood beside Marianne Arden.
They were holding hands.
May you like
And beneath the photograph, Margot had written:
ASK ADRIEN WHAT HAPPENED THE LAST TIME A KOVAC MAN LOVED AN ARDEN WOMAN.
