A Wedding in Truhart Read Free Page A

As if something had made him too angry to cry. I cried for all of them, and maybe a little bit for myself that day too. My own father’s grave was just a few rows away.
    I realized that Nick was gazing intently at me. He stood with his head tilted and his hands in his pockets. Did he know what I was thinking about?
    â€œWhere’s your camera?” he asked. “I’m used to seeing you with a camera around your neck all the time.”
    â€œShe doesn’t do that as often anymore, Nick. Remember how much she loved it?” Aunt Addie interjected.
    Explaining how I had given up photography for teaching wasn’t something I wanted to discuss. I had just been laid off from the local high school and didn’t want to elaborate on my apparent double failure.
    Charlotte left Henry’s side and looped her arm in mine. “I can’t wait to introduce you to all my friends.”
    Henry hailed a waiter and grabbed several drinks from his tray. “These are a house specialty. Gin, tequila, and a secret ingredient. You have to try them,” he said, handing them to us.
    Aunt Addie’s eyes grew wide. “I love a good drink.”
    Ian always watered down my mom’s and Aunt Addie’s drinks back at the inn. I started to caution them, but Charlotte grabbed my arm. “Let me introduce you to some of my friends.”
    â€œWait. You know how Mom and Aunt Addie are with alcohol. Maybe I should warn them—”
    â€œThey’ll be fine,” Charlotte said, dragging me into the Governor’s Room.
    With every hour, the party grew louder and the night stretched longer. The room was brimming, and I couldn’t even fathom how all these people knew Charlotte and Henry. I found myself introduced to dozens of relatives and friends of the Lowells. Names started running together and I was pretty sure we met more people than lived within the city limits of Truhart.
    Several of Charlotte’s friends commented on her success and I tried not to brag. With help from Nick, she had landed an amazing job as a correspondent on The Morning Show last year. But it wasn’t easy. She worked long hours and everyone knew she had to deal with a difficult and demanding lead anchor. Scarlett Francis.
    â€œSo far, Charlotte has been able to avoid her tantrums. But we have a bet going on how long it will take before she gets her first tongue-lashing,” confided one of Charlotte’s coworkers.
    â€œIs she really that bad?” someone asked.
    A balding man leaned in and said, “Oh yeah.”
    â€œWe keep telling Charlotte to keep her head down and pretend she has connections on Capitol Hill. God forbid the woman finds out she is from the flyover zone,” said a red-faced man who waved down the waitress for another drink.
    I couldn’t help myself. “Charlotte doesn’t need to justify herself. She has worked hard making a name for herself and it shouldn’t matter where she is from.”
    The red-faced man grabbed a glass of champagne from a passing tray and looked beyond me. “Sure she works hard, but let’s be honest—she is young, blonde, and pretty . . . all the things that make her GATE material,” he said, mentioning the name of the network they all worked for.
    â€œShe was a weekend anchor on our local station by the time she was twenty-two, and was doing headline stories in Detroit before moving to Atlanta.”
    â€œDime a dozen,” the man said, guzzling half his glass as if it was water.
    â€œShe even won an award for her feature on abandoned houses in the city. That one put her right in the thick of some of the most violent neighborhoods in the nation.”
    â€œIf you say so,” he said, looking at the man next to him and winking.
    I could feel heat rising to my face. My voice sounded shrill. “I suppose just because Charlotte is young and pretty people think she is only a piece of fluff, but I would like to see