“That’s a lie,” Father hisses.
The whiskey makes him mean, but the debt made him desperate. So desperate, he used me for this…
“Oh, for God’s sake, enough with the dramatics.” Rosa moves to stand before my father. She barely reaches his chest but somehow makes him step back. “You manipulative pendejo. My Richard trusted you. I kept my silence, but no more. Bring it on if you’re brave enough.”
My father’s face flushes deep red. “You—This?—”
“The girl’s being jilted at the altar. It’s embarrassing, not the apocalypse. Take it as a gift.” She turns to me and pats my arm, smelling of peppermints and expensive perfume. “And mija, sometimes the wedding that doesn’t happen is the best gift you’ll ever receive.”
Does she think I knew? “I—I didn’t know,” I whisper.
The words feel inadequate, pathetic.
Rosa takes my cold hands in her warm, gnarled ones. Her fingers are twisted with arthritis, but her grip is surprisingly strong. “Of course you didn’t. Men like your father count on the silence of good women.”
She winks, patting my cheek. “Don’t worry. This wedding was shit anyway. The flowers? Hideous. Did your mother pick them?”
My mother throws her hair back. “I beg your pardon?”
My throat tightens.
The coughing man staggers to his feet, crashing against the wall, and several people move to help him. His face has gone gray, blood vessels prominent beneath his skin.
The person closest to him, an usher in a dark suit, touches his arm. “Sir, are you alright? Do you need?—”
The man’s head snaps up, and an impossible sound emerges from his throat. Not a cough this time. Something animalistic. Primal. Wrong.
Without warning, he lunges at the usher, teeth sinking into the man’s neck with savage force. Blood sprays across white flowers and satin ribbons, and the usher screams, a high, terrified sound that doesn’t belong in a church, while falling back onto the ground.
Everyone stares.
Then chaos erupts.
People surge toward the exits. Someone knocks over a candelabra, and small flames lick at the carpet. The reverend stumbles backward, Bible falling from nerveless fingers. The coughing man, no longer coughing but snarling, growling, tears at the usher’s throat with bloody teeth.
Is this my fault? For wishing?
Whatever is happening, whatever nightmare is unfolding in that church, has freed me from a promise I never wanted to make.
God forgive me, but some small, selfish part of me is glad.
TWO
DAKOTA
A woman topples over the holy water bucket, quenching the flames, while the coughing man tears into the arm of a woman with inhuman ferocity.
More screams. Bodies shoving each other.
What the fuck is happening?
Someone flails, grabbing a flower arrangement that doesn’t hold. It crashes to the floor, white petals scattering like snow.
“Move!” Julien’s got one arm around Amelia, supporting her weight as she sways on her feet.
My father grabs my mother’s arm as she’s shell-shocked. “Carmen, move!” He hauls her toward the side hallway, gesturing Julien to follow.
“Dios mío!” Rosa’s eyes roll back as her body crumples.
