Chapter 14 - THE LAST CHANCE BEFORE THE AISLE
Chloe rescheduled the wedding for October.
Bayfront Pavilion.
Same fiancé.
Half the guest list.
No corporate donors.
No business partners Raymond hoped to impress.
The morning before the rehearsal, she asked Daniel to meet her at the workshop.
He found her holding the repaired charcoal jacket.
The seamstress had replaced the torn sleeve.
“You fixed it?”
“Mom paid for it.”
Daniel raised an eyebrow.
“She insisted.”
He took the jacket.
Chloe looked nervous.
“I need to ask you something.”
Daniel waited.
“Will you walk me?”
He did not answer immediately.
Chloe’s eyes filled.
“I know I don’t deserve—”
“Stop.”
She looked up.
“This isn’t something you earn by behaving correctly.”
That was the logic he wanted all of them to stop using.
Belonging as reward.
Love as leverage.
Chloe swallowed.
“Then will you?”
Daniel thought carefully.
“Is this what you want?”
“Yes.”
“Or is this an apology?”
She hesitated.
Then laughed quietly.
“Both.”
“Then ask me again when it’s only the first one.”
Her face fell.
“Dad.”
“I’m not saying no.”
“Sounds a lot like no.”
He smiled slightly.
“I’m saying I don’t need the aisle to prove I’m your father.”
Chloe looked at him for a long time.
Then nodded.
That evening Raymond arrived for the rehearsal.
No entourage.
No Harbor Crest team.
He had formally withdrawn his acquisition proposal two weeks earlier.
Not because Daniel demanded it.
Chloe did.
“If you want to know me,” she told him, “take my property out of the relationship.”
Raymond complied.
The withdrawal cost his company a strategic development opportunity.
It was the first meaningful thing he had done for Chloe that could not benefit him financially.
Linda arrived separately.
She and Daniel were still living in different parts of the house.
The mortgage refinance was dead.
Marriage counseling continued.
Nobody knew what would happen.
Before rehearsal, Linda approached Daniel.
“I’m sorry about the suit.”
He looked at her.
“I know.”
“I wanted to humiliate you.”
“I know that too.”
She swallowed.
“I hated that Chloe always ran to you first.”
Daniel had not known that.
Linda continued:
“And when Raymond came back, I finally had somebody who made me feel like I hadn’t spent my whole life standing beside the dependable man while everybody loved him for being dependable.”
Daniel stared at her.
“You could have told me you were unhappy.”
“I should have.”
Not forgiveness.
Not repair.
May you like
Truth.
For now, it was enough to enter the final day without another secret waiting behind it.
