The atmosphere inside St. Jude’s Cathedral felt nothing like reverence. It was heavy, judgmental, and suffocating. I stood at the altar gripping a bouquet of roses so tightly that the thorns pierced through the silk ribbon and into my palms. The sharp pain grounded me, the only thing keeping me upright as the silence stretched unbearably long. The ceremony had been delayed forty-five minutes. The organist had stopped playing. Four hundred guests shifted in their seats, whispering freely beneath the vaulted ceiling.

They whispered about me. About my background, my lack of pedigree, and how someone like Ryan Vance could possibly marry a nurse. I kept my eyes locked on a stained-glass martyr, feeling strangely connected to the image. My Vera Wang gown felt impossibly heavy. Ryan’s mother had reminded me that it cost more than my father ever made in a year. My father was gone, three years now, leaving me utterly alone in a room full of strangers who belonged to Ryan’s world, not mine.

In the front row sat Mrs. Vance, radiant in silver, dressed as though she were the bride herself. She wasn’t anxious. She looked victorious. When our eyes met, she smiled slowly, deliberately, and my stomach dropped. Ryan had texted an hour earlier about a sudden “work emergency.” A merger issue. “Please wait,” he wrote. So I did.

My gaze drifted toward the back of the church, searching for an escape. Instead, I found Julian Thorne. He sat partially hidden in shadow, unmistakable even in stillness. The reclusive billionaire CEO of Titan Corp was not known for attending weddings. Ryan had invited him out of ambition, never expecting him to come. Yet there he was, watching me with unsettling focus.

Three years earlier, on a rain-soaked highway, I had pulled a stranger from a burning wreck. I used my own clothing to stop the bleeding in his hand. I recognized the scar on Julian’s skin because I put it there saving his life. I never imagined he remembered me.

The cathedral doors opened, but not for the groom. Mrs. Vance strode down the aisle holding a microphone and a glass of red wine. She mounted the steps, turned to the guests, and announced that there would be no wedding. Ryan, she declared, was with Isabella Sterling, a “real” heiress.

She turned toward me and called me a placeholder. The girl who cooked, cleaned, and waited while Ryan climbed socially. With a violent tug, she ripped the veil from my head, scraping my scalp. Then she raised her glass and poured the wine over my dress. The red liquid soaked the silk like blood.

Laughter rippled through the front rows. My legs gave out. I collapsed to the marble floor, humiliation crushing the air from my lungs. Mrs. Vance hissed for me to leave before security arrived.

Then the laughter stopped.

The sound of firm footsteps echoed through the cathedral. Julian Thorne stepped forward, commanding silence without a word. He knelt beside me in the spilled wine, his expensive suit ruined without hesitation. His hand rested on my shoulder.

“Look at me, Maya,” he said softly. “Not now. Not when you’re about to win.”

He stood and pulled me up. With a silk handkerchief, he gently wiped the wine from my face. When Mrs. Vance tried to interrupt, Julian turned to her with lethal calm. He spoke of the accident, how strangers had filmed his burning car instead of helping, and how one woman had saved his life.

“She is the only person here with integrity,” he said, holding me close. Then he revealed the truth. Isabella Sterling didn’t exist. She was an actress he had hired to test Ryan’s loyalty. The merger was fake. A trap.

Mrs. Vance dropped the microphone.

“This wedding is canceled,” Julian announced. “But this isn’t the end. Maya was never meant for mediocrity.”

He led me down the aisle, past whispers and shock. At the doors, he stopped and looked at me.

“Pretend you’re marrying me,” he whispered. “Just for today. Let me rewrite what they tried to destroy.”

I stepped into the sunlight with him, leaving my old life behind.