Sadie looked between us. “Is that another of your brothers?” she asked, confused.
Kaitlyn smiled triumphantly. “Oh no, Sadie. This is Leif Svensson, your future husband and the man Parker is selling you to.”
60
Sadie
“Parker, I don’t understand.”
He looked at Kaitlyn in shock.
“I’m sorry, Parker. I feel like she has a right to know,” Kaitlyn said.
“Is this what you were talking about last night?” I said. My skirt was still bunched up in my hand with the coffee-stained napkin. “Wait, that doesn’t make any sense. Why would he sell me to a cult?”
“I told you,” Kaitlyn said in apparent sympathy. “It was all a game to him. Can’t trust those billionaires.”
I couldn’t tell if it was genuine. I hadn’t had my pancakes yet. I wasn’t thinking clearly.
“None of this is true,” Parker said to me.
Kaitlyn made a face. “Of course it is. His father is here, all the way from Wyoming. Money has changed hands.”
“What money?”
“Darling daughter,” my father boomed, the bell on the café door jingling as he barged in. Moonbeam rushed to hug me.
“Isn’t it great? I can’t wait for the wedding!” she said, her perfume making me cough.
“Did she accept, Leif?” my dad asked happily.
“I’m not getting married!” I shrieked. I turned to Parker “You set this up!”
He shook his head, mute.
My father beamed.
I was getting dizzy turning from Parker to my father to Kaitlyn to Parker’s father. Parker looked sick. Was it true? It couldn’t be. But…
“Is this why you kept asking me to go out west? You were trying to lure me out there,” I said, backing away.
“The Svenssons gave us the money for you,” my father insisted. “But it will be good, Sadie. You can pay off your debts and have a clean start for your new married life.”
“We’ll be sister wives!” Moonbeam exclaimed.
“I thought…” I said faintly, “you were my father’s girlfriend.” I was going to pass out.
“We decided that I’m going to be Leif’s new wife,” she said. “Isn’t it amazing?”
“But—”
“Leif showed me the way,” my father insisted. “And he said it was in the stars that Moonbeam should be his wife.”
“The money you stole from me—”
“Gone to further the cause. But with the money from the Svenssons, we’ll pay back the creditors. Parker wanted this for you.”
“No, I didn’t,” he spat, eyes blazing.
