Chapter 5: What Kyle Actually Wanted
"I want you to come here," Emma said into the phone.
"Right now.
Before the wedding."
"Emma, we don't need to do this today—"
"If you're not here in twenty minutes, I'm calling the venue and telling them the payment was made without authorization.
I'll have it reversed."
A pause.
"You wouldn't do that."
"Try me."
She ended the call.
Her mother was standing in the kitchen doorway, arms folded, watching.
Daniel looked at Emma.
"What are you thinking?"
"I'm thinking Kyle knew Richard well enough to predict exactly how he'd react.
And the only way he could know that is if he set it up." She picked up her veil from where it had fallen on the chair.
She didn't put it on.
She just held it.
"Someone told me to ask my biological father to walk me down the aisle.
I thought it was my own idea.
But I've been going back through the last few weeks and I can't remember where that thought came from."
Daniel's face went pale.
"He was here for dinner two weeks ago.
You two were talking on the porch for a long time."
"He told me a story," Emma said slowly.
"About a woman he knew whose stepfather walked her down the aisle even though she had a living father.
He said she always regretted it.
That she felt like she'd betrayed her real family." She set the veil down.
"He planted it."
The doorbell rang.
Kyle walked in before anyone invited him.
He was dressed for the wedding already — dark suit, pocket square, easy smile that didn't reach his eyes.
He looked at Emma, then at Daniel, then at their mother standing in the kitchen.
"Alright," he said.
"Let's talk."
"Sit down," Emma said.
He sat.
He crossed one leg over the other like a man at a business meeting.
"You manipulated me into pushing Richard out," Emma said.
"You texted me as my father to make me emotionally attached to the idea of him.
You planted the idea of asking him to walk me down the aisle.
And when Richard reacted the way you knew he would, you were already standing by to pay the venue and become the hero." She looked at him steadily.
"What did you actually want out of this?"
Kyle was quiet for a moment.
Then he smiled — a different kind of smile, the one underneath the other one.
"Richard controls the money in this family," he said.
"You know that, right?
Your mother's house, the business he built — all of it goes to you when he's gone.
Daniel marries you, that becomes family money.
Our family." He glanced at Daniel.
"I've been watching Richard for two years.
He's stubborn and he's proud and he loves that girl like she's made of glass.
All I needed was for her to crack him."
Daniel stood up from his chair.
"You used her grief about her father to break her relationship with Richard so you could position yourself as the one who saved the wedding."
"I made sure the wedding happened," Kyle said simply.
"You're welcome."
"Get out," Daniel said.
Kyle didn't move.
"Think carefully about what you're doing.
I paid $47,000 this week.
You want to start your marriage by making an enemy of me?"
Emma reached into the drawer of the side table beside her.
She set her phone on the coffee table between them.
The recording app was still running.
The red light blinked steadily.
Kyle looked at it.
May you like
The smile disappeared.
"That's been going since you walked in," Emma said.
