Chapter 1 – The Trip I Wasn’t Supposed to Know About
At 35, I believed I had finally found the steady love I had waited for. Jared and I met two years earlier at a housewarming party, where he rescued me from a stubborn wine cork and toasted to imperfect adults. Dating him felt easy. When he proposed at Christmas, I said yes before the waiter finished setting down dessert.
Eight months of wedding planning followed. The venue, flowers, and music were settled, and my ivory dress waited in my closet. Then, one week before the ceremony, Jared grew protective of his phone and vague about a supposed hiking trip with two friends.
I learned the truth by accident. At the mall, his groomsman Dylan congratulated me for being “so understanding about the closure vacation.” Keeping my face calm, I casually mentioned Jared’s evening flight to Bali.
Dylan corrected both lies without realizing it. The flight left Tuesday morning, and the destination was Cancún. Jared was traveling with Miranda, the woman he had dated for three years before meeting me.
I sat in my car afterward, gripping my keys while the future I had planned seemed to disappear. I could have called Jared and screamed. Instead, I went home, stood before my wedding dress, and asked myself what kind of marriage could begin with this deception.
Then I called Liam, my college boyfriend. We had remained loosely connected through birthday messages, and I knew he was single.
“I need an unusual favor,” I told him. “It involves an airport, my lying fiancé, and closure.”
