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On the right there’s Ivor and Natasha, with their son asleep in her arms. Ivor’s in the front pew because I asked him to stand with me, and I watched his face when I did. I’ve never seen my cousin speechless before. He handled it by insulting my tie.

Leo stands at the back by the doors. Two of the Tuesday widows have found out somehow and slipped in at the back too. One of them is Mrs. Danilova, in a fur hat, who is already loudly commenting on the flowers.

And then the door opens, and Galana walks in.

She’s in ivory. A simple dress, long-sleeved and soft, that falls to her ankles. Arina bought it for her yesterday afternoon at a boutique on Armitage, and Evaria took it in at the waist at midnight if Galana’s messages to me were anything to go by. There are pearls in her ears that I know without asking were her mother’s. Her hair’s down, the way she always wears it, and there’s a single white rose in her hands.

She doesn’t have anyone to walk her down the aisle. She walks herself.

All forty feet of it, slowly, with her chin up, past her sisters and my cousin and Mrs. Danilova. She doesn’t look at any of them. She looks at me.

I can’t breathe.

I have stood in front of men with guns. I’ve walked into rooms where I knew nobody would mind if I didn’t walk out. I have never once felt my heart move in my chest the way it does now. It hurts, as if something that was locked for thirty-eight years has finally been opened.

She stops in front of me. She’s shaking, just a little. I can see the rose trembling in her hands.

“You came,” she whispers.

As if there was ever any chance I wouldn’t.

I take her hand.

Father Iestyn marries us in Russian and English both, because Galana asked him to. It doesn’t take long. I don’t hear most of it. I hear the important parts. I hear her say yes in a voice that doesn’t shake at all, and I hear Evaria sob, and Milana whisper, “Oh my God, Eva, get it together,” and Ivor laugh very quietly behind me.

I put the ring on her finger. My hands are steady. Hers aren’t. She has to try twice to get my ring over my knuckle, and when she finally does, she laughs, breathless and wet-eyed.

“I can kiss you now,” I tell her.

“Then hurry up,” she says.

I kiss my wife.

It’s soft and brief, because Father Iestyn is watching and Mrs. Danilova is tutting. But Galana’s hands curl into the lapels of my jacket, the way they did in her kitchen five days ago, and she holds on.

And while her sisters clap and Theo whistles through his fingers and the old priest pretends to be scandalized, I put my mouth by her ear and make her a promise only she can hear.

“You’ll never have to wonder,” I tell her. “Not once. Not for the rest of your life. I don’t want you because your father picked me for you, or because of a deadline, or because of anything you do for me. I want you because you’re you. Exactly as you are. Every single day.”

She goes very still in my arms.

Then she nods, her eyes not leaving mine.

Lunch is in the hall next door. Galana didn’t cook. I made sure of that. I had it brought in from a Georgian restaurant on Devon, enough for forty, because I knew she’d worry otherwise. Mrs. Danilova says the khachapuri is too salty and eats three pieces.

My wife sits at the head of the table with her sisters around her, and somebody fills her plate for once. It’s Arina. Galana stares at it like she’s never seen food before.

I stand by the door and watch her laugh.

Leo comes in quietly from the street. He doesn’t say anything, just catches my eye and tips his head toward the corridor.

I follow him out.

“Riddings,” he says, low. “We just got into his office.”

“And?”

“Empty.” Leo’s face is grim. “Desk cleared. Computers gone. His apartment too. His phone went dead at ten this morning, while you were standing at the altar.”