Jake took my hands, and we said our vows alone at the altar, with everyone finally focused on where they should have been all along.
It wasn’t just a ceremony anymore. It was a promise that he would always, always, stand by my side.
Later that night, we curled up on the couch in our hotel suite, and I asked the question that had been bugging me since the wedding
“How did you know?” I asked. “And why didn’t you prevent this?”
He pulled me closer.
“I’ll explain everything.”
“Remember how Mom asked me to fix her laptop a few days ago? While I was busy, I accidentally saw the open browser tab. She’d been searching how to alter a wedding dress quickly.
And had uploaded a photo of your dress.”
He let out a sigh. “I realized then that she was up to something.”
“I knew that confronting her wouldn’t work, so I set out to gather evidence instead. I didn’t warn you because I wanted to catch her red-handed,” he said, stroking my hair.
“She had to be exposed publicly, or she’d just find another way to make our marriage about her.”
His mother hasn’t said a word to us since.
Not a text, not a call, not even a passive-aggressive comment on social media. The silence should feel strange, but instead, it feels peaceful.
I sleep easier now.
Trust is a strange thing: delicate as lace, as hard-won as those pearl buttons I’d dreamed about since I was 12.
But that day, in front of everyone who mattered to us, Jake proved something more than love.
He proved loyalty. And sometimes, that makes all the difference.
