“You tricked me.”
“Well, you’ve been a bad boy, and you needed to be stopped.”
“I’m one of your kind. How could you?”
“It was easy. I don’t kidnap, kill or clone myself into others to get what I want, do I?”
“I didn’t kill anyone.”
“How did Randel Edgar end up dead then?” asked a familiar voice from behind him.
Charlie spun on the stool to face the real Raphael. “The stupid fool did it to himself. I just hid his body and took his persona.”
“Can’t wait to see how you prove that, but Francine is pressing charges and Indigo is blaming you for everything, including breaking him out of the gulag because you wanted the gold ingots he stole.”
“That ingrate.”
“Guess there is no honor among thieves, after all.”
Two months later – Ossuary Valerian Space Station asteroid
Francine held Raphael’s hand tightly, her heart pounding with bliss and delight. Together, they walked down the petal-strewn aisle toward a platform decorated on each corner with a large Earther arrangement of red and black roses framed by greenery and baby’s breath.
Lucy had brought the flowers and a few other artful accompanying displays with her from the Earth colony the night before as a precious gift for today’s event. Francine was elated to seeanyflowers at her more “important” wedding, let alone roses in the unusual color scheme. The only other decoration was the candles that lined the walls along either side of the center aisle.
As per Raphael’s single stipulation, the color peach was absolutely forbidden. Francine had no trouble agreeing to that. Besides, she preferred the dramatic red-and-black theme. That color combo seemed to better accentuate their surroundings.
The quaint, historic justice building on the Ossuary Valerian Space Station asteroid served as the unusual, but magnificent, location of their tiny wedding. Well, their first wedding.
Her mother was planning the kind of grand affair only she could—or would want to—manage, to be held next month on Alpha-Prime. She’d promised to restrain the celebration to a small to medium wedding, but after only a couple of months of planning, the guest list topped one thousand essential invitees.
Francine bent to her mother’s will, grateful to be back in her parents’ good graces.
Today, Francine and Raphael were getting married the waytheywanted to, with only the attendance of a very few loved ones able to transport to this odd venue for a “destination” wedding, as it was called on Earth.
The magistrate waited at the walkway’s end, Lucy and Axel on the left, Elda and Victor on the right.
Francine and Raphael took the last few steps toward the platform, stepping up together to be officially married.
The magistrate opened a large book and began. “We are gathered here today to join together these two souls in blessed matrimony.”
Suddenly, all the candles in the room glowed a little brighter, as if the spirits in the old justice building wanted more light for a better view. Francine glanced askance at them, then focused her attention back on the magistrate.
She’d asked her parents if they wanted to come to this smaller ceremony, but her mother preferred to wait to see the fifth and final Duvall wedding celebrated with all the pomp and circumstance that only an Alpha-Prime upper-class wedding venue could provide.
Raphael agreed—very surprisingly—to the grand Alpha-Prime nuptials without much prodding. He told her he viewed it as a small price to pay for future harmony in each of their respective families.
Lucius Boudreaux, Raphael’s obstinate father, had been no match for the will of Adeline Duvall in the matter of the pretentious wedding and agreed to not only participate, but to pay for half of it, including the couple’s two-week honeymoon on the Gothic Ice Floe Planet.
Raphael told Francine he suspected Will and Alex had more to do with the financial offer and any of the “getting along with the bride’s family” than his father, but Lucius hadn’t growled or tried to halt any of the preparations.
A major victory, according to Raphael.
“If there is anyone who has just cause to keep these two apart, let them speak now or forever hold their peace.”
The candles dimmed noticeably.
