Chapter 3: The Sentence on the Screen
Jacob read the message twice.
“What does it say?” I asked.
The wedding coordinator, a young woman named Tessa, kept both hands around her phone.
“The email says, ‘Process it before the ceremony.
Once Jacob and I are married, his mother won’t be able to reverse anything without humiliating her own son.’”
Chairs scraped across the floor.
Amanda reached for the phone again, but Tessa stepped behind the manager.
“That is not what I meant,” Amanda said.
“It was about the honeymoon reservation.”
“You attached a transfer form bearing my mother’s signature,” Jacob said.
“I was fixing a problem you created.”
“What problem?”
Amanda’s eyes moved toward me.
“Ask Judith why she promised to pay for everything and then started questioning every expense.”
“I questioned one charge,” I said.
“The one I never authorized.”
“You said this wedding was your gift.”
“A gift is not permission to copy my signature.”
Amanda folded her arms.
“You’re confused.
You signed so many papers that you probably forgot this one.”
I opened Harold’s ledger and removed a copy of the disputed form.
“Then tell me why the signature spells my middle name incorrectly.”
Jacob took the page.
His thumb stopped beneath the name.
Amanda’s voice sharpened.
“She is seventy-three, Jacob.
Memory changes.”
“So does handwriting,” I said.
“But my name does not.”
A few guests lowered their eyes.
Amanda’s mother slipped out through a side door without speaking.
Jacob looked at the form again.
“Where was the money going?”
The manager pointed to a line near the bottom.
“Twelve thousand to the resort.
Ten thousand to an account ending in 4417.”
“That’s not our joint account,” Jacob said.
Amanda pulled off one white glove.
“I was going to move it back after my father reimbursed us.”
“Your father didn’t know about it.”
“You don’t know that.”
A man rose from the last table.
He was tall, gray-haired, and still wearing his coat as if he had arrived late.
“I know it,” he said.
Amanda went perfectly still.
“Dad?”
The man walked between the tables and stopped beside Jacob.
“My name is Conrad Pierce.
Amanda told me Judith refused to contribute anything.
She said Jacob had taken out a personal loan to pay for this wedding.”
Jacob shook his head.
“Judith paid forty-eight thousand dollars.”
“More than sixty after the upgrades,” I said.
Conrad closed his eyes for a moment.
“Amanda asked me for fifteen thousand last month.”
“That was for the honeymoon,” Amanda said quickly.
“You told me it was for Judith’s medical care.”
The room became so quiet I could hear the microphone hum.
Jacob’s hand dropped to his side.
“You used my mother’s name to get money from your father?”
Amanda pointed at me.
“Look at what she’s doing.
She planned this.
She brought a letter because she wanted to destroy our day.”
“I brought the letter because the manager called me last night,” I said.
“He asked why I had requested a cash transfer.”
“And you could have spoken to me privately!”
“I tried to speak to you about a chair at a table.
You treated even that like an inconvenience.”
Jacob’s eyes met mine, but I saw no apology there yet—only fear.
Amanda seized his hand.
“Come upstairs with me.
We’ll leave, and our attorney will handle this.”
Conrad blocked the aisle.
“Before you go, tell Jacob about the apartment.”
“What apartment?” Jacob asked.
Amanda’s grip loosened.
Conrad took an envelope from inside his coat.
“The one she rented six weeks ago under her former fiancé’s name.”
Amanda’s face emptied of color.
Jacob stared at the envelope.
“Former fiancé?”
May you like
Conrad handed it to him.
“His name is Nathan Cole—and according to these records, Amanda sent him part of your mother’s money yesterday.”
