Stamped into it were the numbers:

417.

There was also a note.

Four words.

ASK HIM ABOUT REBECCA.

Dad called Keene.

Keene went silent.

Then he said,

“I need to make another call.”

Thirty minutes later, he called back.

“There is no Rebecca Sloan.”

Dad frowned.

“What do you mean?”

“There was.”

Dad put him on speakerphone.

I sat at the kitchen island still wearing my rehearsal dinner dress.

Keene continued.

“Rebecca Elaine Sloan married a man named Ethan James Caldwell eight years ago in Rhode Island.”

My heart stopped.

Dad slowly sat down.

Keene said,

“There is no divorce record.”

I couldn’t breathe.

“No.”

“There’s more.”

Of course there was.

There is always more when your life has already collapsed.

“Rebecca Sloan disappeared from public records approximately six years ago.

No social media.

No current address.

No employment record I can find.

But I located a property deed in Maine associated with her mother.”

Dad asked, “Is she alive?”

“I believe so.”

I stared at the silver key lying between us.

My fiancé had a wife.

Possibly.

And in less than twenty-four hours, he intended to marry me.

“Find her,” Dad said.

Then he turned toward me.

“You can stop this right now.”

I should have.

But something in Ethan’s video with Claire wouldn’t leave me alone.

Once we’re married, it won’t matter anymore.

Everything changes.

He wasn’t talking like a cheating fiancé trying to delay a breakup.

He was talking about a deadline.

A transaction.

I picked up the silver key.

“No.”

Dad studied me.

“I want him standing in that ballroom.”

“Anna—”

“I want him surrounded by every person he lied to.”

My voice shook, but I meant every word.

“And I want him to understand that I know.”

So twenty-four hours later, I walked down the aisle.

Ethan cried when he saw me.

That almost destroyed me.

He stood beneath an arch covered in roses, wearing a black tuxedo and the same expression he had worn when I said yes to his proposal.

Tender.

Awed.

Loving.

For half a second, I wanted the emails to disappear.

I wanted time to rewind.

I wanted Claire to be only my sister again.

I wanted Ethan to be the man I thought he was.

Then I remembered his hand over Claire’s in the car.

Just wait until after the wedding.

So I smiled.

We had agreed to have dinner and speeches before exchanging vows because the ceremony was scheduled near sunset.

Ethan thought it was romantic.

I thought it was useful.

My father’s speech came twenty-two minutes before we were supposed to become husband and wife.

And when the video began playing, Ethan finally understood why.

Claire’s voice echoed through the ballroom.

“I can’t keep doing this.”

Several guests turned toward her.

She covered her face.

Ethan lunged for the projection equipment.

Dad stepped between them.

“Don’t.”

“Turn it off!”

Then the recording reached the sentence.

Once we’re married, it won’t matter anymore.