Itan gave a bitter laugh.
“You’re having me thrown out?”
“I’m asking you to leave my wedding.”
“There is no wedding.”
Liam looked at him for a long moment.
“Exactly.”
Sofia sank into a chair.
The dress she had chosen for the happiest day of her life spread around her like white silk wreckage.
Her veil had slipped crookedly across one shoulder.
“I can’t believe you’re doing this to me,” she whispered.
Liam turned back.
That sentence almost broke his composure.
“Doing this to you?”
She looked away.
He shook his head.
“I spent three weeks hoping I was wrong.
Chloe spent five years trusting him.
You had every opportunity to tell the truth before today.”
His voice lowered.
“You chose the wedding dress instead.”
Sofia began sobbing.
No one moved to comfort her.
Itan finally headed toward the exit, but before he reached the doors, he turned toward me.
“You’ll regret making this public.”
I met his eyes.
“The affair was yours.
The shame isn’t mine.”
He left.
The doors closed behind him.
For several seconds, nothing happened.
Then Sofia stood.
She looked at Liam one last time.
“Was any of it real to you?”
My brother’s face twisted with pain.
“All of it.”
That answer seemed to wound her more than hatred would have.
Because Liam had not been pretending.
She had.
He looked toward the ballroom entrance.
“You should go.”
Sofia gathered the train of her wedding dress and walked away through the same room she had expected to cross as Liam’s wife.
Nobody applauded.
Nobody followed.
Within minutes, the wedding music had stopped.
The ceremony chairs remained perfectly aligned.
The flowers were still fresh.
The chandeliers still glittered.
Everything looked ready for a celebration that no longer existed.
Liam stood staring at the empty aisle.
I went to him.
For the first time that day, his composure vanished.
He sat down heavily in the front row and covered his face with both hands.
I sat beside him.
Neither of us spoke.
There was nothing clever left to say.
The public revelation had looked powerful from the outside, but power did not erase betrayal.
