“I can’t do this,” Jennifer said. “I’m sorry, Sean, Hannah. I can’t get married like this, not knowing that my best friend and maid of honor might have killed someone.”
Everyone started talking at once. Hannah hung back, not sure what to do. The situation had escalated so quickly. She wished that she’d never come up here to talk to Rudy. She wished she had just kept her mouth shut until after the wedding like she’d agreed to do.
“Stop!” Rudy shouted. It took a moment, but eventually all eyes were on him and the room fell silent.
“You can’t change my mind,” Jennifer said. “I should have just canceled the wedding to begin with, but I’m serious when I say can’t go forward like this. This was the last straw.”
“Eliza’s not the one who killed her,” Rudy said. “I am.”
Hannah could have heard paint drying on the walls. She could hear voices in the kitchen where the other guests were talking, unaware of the commotion upstairs. At last, Sean spoke up.
“You’re kidding,” he said, trying to laugh it off. “I know you’re trying to make this the perfect day for both of us, but you don’t have to take the fall for someone else. This is serious.”
“I’m being serious,” Rudy replied. He fidgeted, looking down at his hands. “It was an accident. I swear. I was up here with her, just chatting about the wedding and what her plans were for helping to set up, then I spotted that stupid camera. We argued about it and I tried to take it from her. It must have gone off then. She yanked it out of my hands and backed up to stand by the window. When I came forward to try to take it from her again, she slapped me. That was when I shoved her. She had never hit me before. I was shocked. I didn’t know what I was doing. I didn’t even think about how close she was standing to the window or the fact that the window was open. I shoved her and she just went through the screen. I remember her scream. I remember seeing that camera in her hands as she fell. I ran downstairs but there was no way to help her, and I realized no one else knew what I had done. I thought… I don’t know what I thought. I didn’t want to go to jail. I didn’t want to wreck the wedding for Sean. I just wanted everything to go away.”
Hannah saw tears in his eyes and felt for him, but couldn’t resist a look back at her brother. His face was pale, his mouth hanging open in shock.
“You were so adamant about us going ahead with the wedding. I don’t understand. Why… Why all of this? You should’ve just come forward in the beginning. If you had, I might have been able to accept that it was a horrible, horrible accident. But now, after you tried to hide it? I just don’t know.”
“It was an accident,” Rudy said. “And maybe I should’ve told you. I didn’t want to be the reason you called the wedding off, though. No one wanted me to bring Kiersten in the first place, and I already felt bad enough about that. I knew that when this eventually came out, everyone would hate me, and I didn’t want that to be how you remembered your wedding.”
The room fell silent once more until Jennifer cleared her throat. “What now? I mean, the wedding is still off. I don’t think any of us can bear to walk down the aisle like this. But what do we do now?”
Sean and Rudy exchanged a long look. Rudy nodded slightly. With a sigh, Sean stepped forward. “I’m going to take Rudy to the police station. If someone else wants to come to make sure that I’m actually taking him there and not putting him on a plane to Mexico or getting him a train ticket to Canada, feel free. While I do that, someone is going to need to tell everyone else what happened and cancel with the pastor and the DJ.”
“I’ll call Caroline,” Hannah said. “Don’t worry about the food. We’ll figure out something to do with it so it won’t go to waste.”
“We’ve still got a bunch of guests to feed,” Jennifer said with a weak attempt at a smile. “You might as well let them have at it while they wait for their flights home.”
Epilogue
Hannah tapped a button on her laptop and the image on the screen changed to one of her brother and Jennifer standing under an arch decorated with brightly colored flowers. There was a beach behind them. The water was a sparkling blue and both of them were grinning.
“They look so happy,” Caroline said next to her. They were at her house, enjoying one of their rare evenings off together with some snacks and drinks.
“I think they are,” Hannah said. “They still had the honeymoon scheduled, and it was too late to cancel that. They finally had a lovely ceremony without any interruptions, and in a gorgeous location, too.”
“This makes me glad that the worst thing that happened at my wedding was one of the bridesmaids spilling soda on her dress.”
Hannah laughed. “It certainly wasn’t how anyone thought the day would go. I’m happy for them, though. They love each other, and it’s hard to complain about a Hawaii wedding.”
“Still, it’s got to be rough for Sean,” Caroline said. “Rudy was his best friend. I can’t even imagine what it would be like to have you go to jail for killing Ben or whatever the equivalent would be.”
“I promise not to push Ben out of any windows anytime soon,” Hannah said, crossing her heart. More seriously, she added, “It’s been tough on Sean. I think the hardest part is that he just doesn’t know what to feel. Yes, Rudy killed her, but he never meant to. I think Sean probably could’ve forgiven him if he had admitted the truth right away. It sounds like it was an honest accident. She hit him, and he reacted instinctively to push her away. But hiding the truth for so long… that’s harder.”
“It’s a tough situation all around,” Caroline said, shaking her head. “Hopefully, our next catering job goes better than this did.”
Hannah grinned. “Actually, I think the catering was the only thing that went right.”
Also by Patti Benning
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Wedding Woes Page 7
