I Made His Wife’s Dress Now I’ll Marry Another Chapter 01
I spent eleven months making my own wedding dress.
But on the night of the Whitmore centennial show, the woman who walked up the grand staircase wearing it was my adopted sister, Sabine.
She stood in the spotlight, one hand resting on a stomach that wasn’t yet showing, the other looped through my fiancé Adrian’s arm. The reporters’ flashes bleached the world white. He didn’t let go of her. He simply stood by as his PR team announced that the baby was his, and that they would be getting married as soon as possible.
Backstage, the size card I had written for myself still hung from the garment rack.
I reached inside the gown and found the hand-sewn label hidden at the waist seam, in the most discreet place I could manage—
Clara Whitmore, Bride.
With my dressmaker’s shears, I sliced it from the seam, broke off the engagement, and flew to Paris that same night.
Over the next six years, Adrian sent me more than three hundred emails.
I never replied to a single one.
I didn’t set foot in New York again until my mother’s kidneys began to fail, and the donor lined up for her paired exchange suddenly backed out.
…
When I pushed my luggage cart out of JFK, Adrian was standing by the last pillar in the pickup area.
Six years had worn the sharpness from his features, leaving something heavier in its place. He hadn’t brought an assistant. There were no reporters. Just an old silver sedan waiting at the curb—the same car he used to drive me to the fabric market when we were engaged.
I meant to pretend I hadn’t seen him, but he stepped directly in front of my cart.
“Clara.”
He said my name softly, as if it were a fragile thing he’d held on his tongue for too long.
I saw the wedding band.
A narrow circle of platinum, plain and unadorned. Six years ago, when I’d measured his finger myself, he’d told me he hated the feel of a ring against his palm. Now it sat on his finger like a verdict handed down years ago.
“Move.”
He gripped the handle of my cart, his knuckles white, careful not to touch me. “The car’s outside. Your mother was transferred to Hudson University Medical Center. Nephrology and the transplant team are waiting for you to sign the medical proxy forms.”
“I know.”
“You just got off the plane. You don’t know what happened today. She had an episode of pulmonary edema around dawn. They stabilized her. The original donor chain collapsed, and the new match screening—”
“Mr. Vail,” I cut in. “I have my mother’s doctor’s number, and I know how to read a medical chart.”
His fingers tightened on the handle.
I used to call him Adrian. I was twelve the first time I sewed a button back onto his shirt. Seventeen when I went with him to his senior prom. Twenty-three when I accepted his proposal to the applause of both our families. I thought I’d spend my life making his clothes.
In the end, I only ever finished one wedding dress—for his wife.
“It’s been six years,” he said, his voice hoarse. “Do you really have to treat me like a stranger?”
“A stranger wouldn’t be wearing a wedding ring while asking me that.”
The color drained from his face.
I pushed past him toward the taxi line, but he held out a document envelope. A red transplant-center sticker was affixed to the front. Inside were my mother’s latest dialysis records and an authorization form that required in-person confirmation.
“You’re still listed as her medical proxy,” he said. “Get in the car. Don’t waste her time just to spite me.”
It was an ugly thing to say.
It was also exactly what I was afraid he’d be right about.
I stopped, held my ground for a few seconds, then got into his car.