His Childhood Sweetheart Erased Our Wedding-So I Married Someone Else Chapter 04

His Childhood Sweetheart Erased Our Wedding-So I Married Someone Else Chapter 04

On day twenty-two, Gavin suddenly called and said he was coming home early.

There was a smile in his voice. “I miss you. I’ll be home tomorrow.”

I held the phone in silence for three seconds before saying, “Okay.”

My heart still skipped a beat. Four years of habit did not disappear overnight.

I cleaned the apartment, then went to the grocery store for the ingredients to make his favorite dinner.

My hand was already reaching toward a shelf when I caught myself.

What was I doing?

But the food was already in my cart.

He returned to the apartment around noon the next day.

He dropped his luggage by the door and gave me a brief hug. After almost a month away, he was thinner and more tanned, with exhaustion from the long drive written across his face. His jacket still carried the cold scent of the mountains.

“We finished the entire mountain drive. I’m never doing that again. Erin, I called the church. The pastor agreed to hold a small ceremony for us tomorrow afternoon.”

I nodded.

As I unpacked his luggage, I found a red woven bracelet in a side pocket.

It had clearly been woven by a woman. The weave was tight and even, and a tiny bow had been tied at one end.

Gavin paused when he saw it in my hand, then casually took it from me.

“It’s just a souvenir from a roadside craft shop.”

He did not explain who had made it, and I did not ask.

That afternoon, we went to the church to confirm the arrangements for the next day’s ceremony with the wedding coordinator.

The wedding coordinator had barely opened the ceremony schedule in a side room when Gavin’s phone rang. He stepped away, spoke in a low voice for a few moments, then returned looking troubled.

“Lily wants me to pick up a package for her. It’s nearby.”

He was gone for forty minutes.

By the time he returned, our scheduled appointment had passed. The coordinator said we had missed the rehearsal, so the pastor could only fit us in for a brief ceremony the following afternoon.

Gavin frowned at me. “Why didn’t you ask the coordinator to wait a little longer?”

I looked at him and said nothing.

During dinner that night, his phone rang more than twenty times. Each time, he glanced at the screen and turned it facedown on the table.

As I cut the food on my plate, one notification flashed into view.

“Gavin, tomorrow is my birthday. You promised me.”

The contact name was nothing but a mountain emoji.

I set down my fork. “Are you free tomorrow? We’ll go to the church and have the small ceremony, just as we agreed.”

“Yes,” he said. “Of course I am.”

The following morning, I woke to an empty space beside me.

A note was waiting on the nightstand.

“Today is Lily’s birthday. I’m only dropping off her present, then I’ll come straight back. I’ll be home by noon, and we’ll go to the church this afternoon. I promise.”

I sat on the edge of the bed and stared at it.

A quiet, humorless laugh escaped me.

I opened the closet. I had returned my wedding dress the week before. In its place hung a new ivory dress, simple and sleek.

Gavin did not come home by noon.

At two, he called and said someone at Lila’s birthday party had gotten drunk, so he had to drive them home.

At three thirty, he called again. This time, he said Lila would not stop crying and refused to let him leave.

After I hung up, I stopped answering.

At four, Noah called.

“The client approved the proposal. They’re taking the project team to dinner tonight. Are you coming?”

I put on the ivory dress, did my makeup, applied lipstick, sprayed on perfume, and left the apartment.

Not for anyone else.

For me.

Gavin came home at ten that night and found me changing my shoes by the front door, still wearing the dress.

His gaze swept over me. “Where did you go? Why are you dressed like that?”

I walked past him and answered calmly, “I went on a date.”

He froze.

I kept walking, entered the bedroom, shut the door, and locked it.

Gavin pounded on the door for ten minutes. His voice went from impatient to furious, then low and hoarse.

“Erin, open the door. What do you mean you went on a date? Open the door and explain this! Erin!”

I sat on the edge of the bed and opened the folder I had been building on my phone for the past month.

Inside was the confirmation for a small church ceremony scheduled for the day after tomorrow.

The marriage license paperwork attached to it had already been filled out.

Another man’s name filled the space marked Groom.

It was not Gavin’s.