Canceled Wedding, Upgraded Life

The day before our wedding, my fiancé skipped the rehearsal. That night, my screen lit up with his texts. [ Piper is pregnant.

The baby isn't mine. ] [ But I have to marry her first. Just on paper, so the kid has a legal father on the birth certificate. ] [ Let's push our wedding back three years.

Don't contact me until then. ] [ Figure out a way to explain this to our parents.

Don't let this ruin Piper's reputation… just tell them you got cold feet. ] My thumb hovered over the glass. I typed a single word. [ Okay. ] I locked the screen.

He was right about one thing—I was done with this wedding. Chapter 1 Almost immediately, Piper uploaded a new post.

The photo showed two hands wearing matching rings, their fingers curled together to form a heart. Framed inside the heart was an ultrasound scan. Seven weeks.

The caption read: [ He said he's going to give us a family. ] In the comments, Pierce's buddies were hitting like, congratulating them on finally making it official.

They promised to write fat checks for the big day tomorrow. Not a single person mentioned me. It was as if tomorrow's wedding had always belonged to the two of them. I didn't exist.

A dry laugh scraped my throat.

I doubletapped the photo and typed a comment. [ Wishing you both a lifetime of happiness. ] My comment blended right in with the wall of congratulations. It wasn't out of place.

But it vanished. Deleted. My phone buzzed in my palm. Pierce.

I swiped to answer. "Harlow, what the hell is your problem?" He didn't bother saying hello. "What kind of stunt are you pulling with that comment?" My jaw tightened. "I'm not pulling a stunt.

I was genuinely wishing you the best." "Oh, please.

Like I don't know exactly what you're doing." His breath hitched over the line. "Everyone knows tomorrow was supposed to be our wedding.

You jumping in with that passiveaggressive comment—you just wanted people to laugh at Piper. Apologize to her.

She hasn't stopped crying." A woman's muffled sobs drifted through the receiver. "Pierce, just drop it." Piper's voice trembled in the background. "I never should have asked for your help." "I'll call the clinic and book the abortion right now.

So what if this is my only chance to be a mother? It's better than everyone calling me a homewrecker!" Pierce shifted the phone.

His tone dropped into a soothing hum. "Piper, you are not a homewrecker." "We're going to the courthouse tomorrow. We'll be legally married.

On paper and everything." "Don't listen to that brainless bullshit.

If anyone dares to laugh at you, I'll shut them down myself." Piper's sobs only grew louder. "But what about Harlow? She must be devastated." "I should just go to the clinic.

You two should just have your wedding tomorrow…" "Piper, I already worked it out with her." Pierce sounded frantic now. "She just has to wait three years to get everything she wants.

It's not like I'm disappearing." "Stop crying, okay? You're going to upset the baby. Plus, your eyes are going to get all puffy.

How are you going to be a beautiful bride tomorrow with swollen eyes?" A wet, shaky laugh came through the speaker. Pierce let out a heavy breath.

When he addressed me again, the edge in his voice had dulled slightly. "Harlow, why are you just sitting there? Apologize to Piper." My nails dug into my palms.

I hated myself for even tapping that screen. But I hadn't done anything wrong.

I had nothing to apologize for. "Pierce," I said, keeping my voice dead flat. "What if I say no?" Chapter 2 He froze.

His voice spiked through the speaker. "Harlow, if you keep throwing a tantrum, this is going to get ugly!" "Piper is pregnant.

Her hormones are all over the place, and you're deliberately making her cry." "Grow up! Fine, don't apologize." "But you're going to fix this.

Text everyone right now and tell them you got cold feet!" The line went dead. He hung up before I could refuse. A text popped up. [ Harlow, I'm begging you, stop making a scene.

I'm just marrying Piper on paper. It doesn't mean anything.

I'm postponing our wedding so I can give you the dream wedding you deserve at the right time. ] A familiar burn scratched at the back of my throat. The right time.

I had swallowed that excuse for eight years. I spent nearly three thousand days waiting for him to put a ring on my finger.

Instead, I was watching him become someone else's legal husband. I'm done waiting, Pierce. We were never the right fit anyway. The text vanished from my screen. Message unsent.

A new one appeared. [ I had to delete that. Piper might see it and overthink things in her condition. Just do what I asked. ] [ I'll make up for everything in three years.

You have the rest of my life! ] A dry laugh scraped my throat. I stared at the screen for two minutes. Right on cue, the message disappeared. Unsent. Was he lying to me or himself?

If he was just helping Piper out, why did he care if she saw his promises to me? The baby wasn't even his, and he was burning my life to the ground for her.

What if the baby actually was his? I shook my head, clearing the static from my brain. I typed out a single word: Okay. Hit send. A red exclamation mark bounced back.

Message Not Delivered. To keep Piper happy, he couldn't even wait a minute to block my number. Good. I locked my phone and opened Instagram.

I posted a quick story announcing the wedding cancellation. The DMs flooded in instantly. Not wanting the drama, I stuck to Pierce's script.

I told them I wasn't ready to settle down. My friends immediately blew up my phone. [ Harlow, don't be stupid. Pierce isn't that broke college kid anymore.

Half the city is trying to get into his pants. Canceling the wedding is basically handing him over to those vultures. ] I ignored them. Pierce was already someone else's husband.

Ten minutes later, a picture landed in my texts from an unknown number. A shiny new marriage certificate. Piper's gloating text followed. [ Thanks for the assist, Harlow!

Pierce and I were supposed to go to the courthouse tomorrow, but he pulled some strings to get the paperwork pushed through tonight just to cheer me up! ] I didn't blink. Blocked.

Deleted. My phone vibrated again. Mom. I answered, and her voice immediately assaulted my ear. "Are you out of your mind? You're throwing away a catch like Pierce over what?

Cold feet?

You think he's going to sit around waiting for you to change your mind?" A hollow chuckle escaped my lips. "What if he's the one who didn't want to get married?" She paused.

Then, her tone hardened. "Then you obviously did something wrong." "Swallow your pride, apologize, and beg him if you have to.

You've wasted too many years on him to walk away with nothing!" Chapter 3 Eight years. That’s how long Pierce and I had been together.

His favorite excuse used to be career first, ring second.

But now that he had the corner office, the penthouse, and the luxury cars, giving me a family was the last thing on his mind. It wasn't for lack of trying.

For eight years, I helped him build his startup. I lived in crappy basement apartments and survived on ramen with him.

I swallowed my pride more times than I could count, telling him my only dream was to be his wife, for richer or poorer. I even had three abortions.

All because he kept saying the timing wasn't right, that he didn't want our kids to grow up struggling. I loved him.

So I choked down every grievance and gave him whatever he wanted. Just like tonight, when he said he wanted to marry his childhood friend.

When I read that text, my lungs constricted like I’d swallowed glass. But right after the pain, a strange, hollow relief washed over me. The wedding was off.

I didn't have to scrape the bottom of the barrel waiting for him to marry me anymore.

Mom was still rambling on the phone, lecturing me about how men preferred women who played the damsel in distress.

The urge to vent to her dried up instantly. "Mom, the wedding is off. I'm not marrying him." I pulled the phone away from my ear and hit end. Next, I dialed the wedding planner.

The planner went dead silent. "Mr.

Pierce actually already called it in." "He just… he asked us to keep all the stage setups and custom banners in storage for three years." "That's going to be a problem.

Most of that stuff was custommade for onetime use…" The realization clicked into place. It wasn't that he didn't have time to text our friends and family.

He just didn't want to deal with the fallout.

He actually thought I’d sit in a dusty storage unit for three years, just like those cheap cardboard cutouts, waiting for him to pull me back out. "Throw it all away," I said. "Even if it wasn't singleuse, it'd rot after three years anyway." Just like whatever he felt for me.

Time would eat it all away. I ended the call and scrolled down to Pierce's mother's contact. A headache began pulsing behind my temples. She despised Piper.

If she found out her golden boy had just eloped with her, she'd probably pop a blood vessel.

I took a deep breath, opened my banking app, and wired back the exact $88,000 she had given us for the wedding fund. I counted to three in my head.

My phone rang. "Harlow, why did the bank just notify me about the wedding money?" "Mom, Pierce and I are calling off the wedding for now.

I'm going abroad for three years." I fed her the line, but she was too sharp. "Did Pierce do something to you? I'm driving over to his place right now.

That wedding is happening tomorrow!" "Ma'am, the wedding really isn't happening—" The dial tone buzzed in my ear. She had already hung up.

Pierce could deal with his own mother's wrath. It was time for me to pack my bags. I walked through the condo. Custom wedding decorations clung to the windows.

Every carefully curated detail in this place used to be a promise of our future. Now, looking at them just made my chest tight, forcing me to take shallow breaths.

I didn't have much to take. My clothes and essentials didn't even fill one suitcase. But I had a mountain of things to throw away.

By the time I finished hauling the trash bags to the chute, I checked my phone. Seven missed calls from Pierce. I didn't need to guess.

He was definitely going to scream at me for failing to handle his mother. I dropped my spare key onto the entryway console.

I grabbed the edge of the large framed wedding portrait we had meant to hang, ready to walk out the door. The front door swung open. Pierce collided hard against me.

The portrait slipped from my grip. It slammed onto the hardwood floor, the glass shattering into a thousand jagged pieces. A sharp sting flared across the top of my foot.

A line of red welled up where a shard had sliced my skin. Pierce instantly shoved Piper behind him, shielding her body with his.

His jaw clenched. "Harlow, what the hell are you doing? Didn't you see Piper standing right there? What if you hurt her?" His eyes never dropped to the blood pooling on my foot.

Instead, he knelt down, carefully brushing a piece of glass the size of a pea off Piper’s designer sneaker. I gripped the handle of my suitcase.

I didn't have the energy to stand around and watch him play the devoted hero for another woman. I stepped around the broken glass and walked out.

Chapter 4 He caught sight of my suitcase out of the corner of his eye.

He scrambled to his feet and grabbed my arm. "Harlow, where are you going?" Before I could open my mouth, his phone buzzed. The caller ID flashed his mother's name.

He answered it, irritation rolling off him. "Fine! I get it! It's not canceled!" "I'll handle her!

Just drop it!" He hung up and turned back to me. "Harlow, my mom is demanding the wedding goes ahead tomorrow.

I don't want to piss her off, so we'll keep the schedule." "But I need you to be a runaway bride." He actually said it with a straight face. "My mom loves you," he continued. "If you leave me at the altar, she won't blame me.

Then I can just tell her I married Piper out of spite." I stared at him. This was the man I had loved for eight years. But then my mind flashed to the digital marriage certificate.

He was Piper's husband now. Nothing he did could shock me anymore. I was leaving anyway.

I could give him one last favor. "Okay." Maybe my deadpan compliance finally snapped him out of his delusion. He looked down.

He saw the shattered glass of our wedding portrait scattered across the hardwood. He saw the thick line of red dripping down my foot. Panic flared in his eyes.

He spun around and sprinted down the hall to grab the firstaid kit. The second he was out of sight, Piper lifted her chin.

The trembling victim act vanished. "Harlow, you are so pathetic." She sneered. "You know I'm his wife, and you still want to walk down the aisle with him?" "So what if his mom hates me?

She can kick and scream, but she still has to watch him marry me." "Tomorrow's wedding is mine. Pierce is mine." "And you?

You're just the homewrecker everyone is going to spit on." "Don't even dream about him divorcing me in three years to come back to you, because…" Her hand drifted down to rest on her flat stomach.

Her smile widened into something venomous. [ This baby is his. ] I blinked hard, forcing the sudden, sharp burn at the back of my throat to stay down. He really had betrayed me.

And he had played me for a fool, asking me to wait in the wings for three years. I did the math in my head. Seven weeks. That was the night he didn't come home.

The night he forgot my birthday because of a late client dinner. He came back the next morning, reeking of guilt, and apologized. Then, he got down on one knee.

He promised me a dream wedding. I had waited eight years for that ring. The massive spike of dopamine smothered my doubts. But that night, he forgot to lock the bathroom door.

I walked in and saw the scratches raked down his back. Raw, red lines. When I confronted him, he didn't even flinch. He said a stray cat got him in the alley.

He even pulled up a digital receipt for a rabies clinic on his phone. I swallowed the lie because I wanted to. But the static never left my brain.

Even while picking out floral arrangements and tasting cake, nothing felt real.

A persistent voice in the back of my head kept whispering the truth—he only proposed to pay off his guilt.

I just played the ostrich, burying my head in the sand so I wouldn't have to look at the wreckage. Until I couldn't ignore it anymore. I had started tracking his location.

His client meetings always pinged right at Piper's apartment complex. Since then, I'd just been waiting for the executioner's axe to drop.

That was why I didn't blow up his phone when he skipped the rehearsal.

That was why I didn't fight back when he texted me about marrying her. "Move." I wasn't going to waste my breath on her. I gripped my suitcase handle and stepped forward.

Heavy footsteps pounded down the hall. Pierce was coming back. Just as his shadow hit the wall, Piper's hand shot out. Her fingers clamped around my wrist like a vise.

Without breaking eye contact, she yanked backward, throwing her own body weight directly into the pile of shattered glass.

Chapter 5 "Harlow, I know you hate me, but why did you push me?" Piper wailed. "Ah, my stomach… my baby… it hurts…" She lifted her hand. A fresh cut sliced across her palm.

Pierce lunged forward. "Piper, it's okay, I've got you. I'm taking you to the ER right now." He scooped her into his arms.

He didn't even stop moving as he shot a glare over his shoulder. "I didn't think you were this vicious, Harlow. Going after a pregnant woman?

If anything happens to this baby, we are entirely done." I watched his back disappear down the hall. "We've been done for a long time," I whispered to the empty air.

By the time I swept the last of the glass into the dustpan, the cut on my foot had clotted. My chest, though, felt like it was packed with wet cement.

I pulled out my phone and dialed the other board members. The second I mentioned offloading my thirty percent stake in the startup, the offers started rolling in.

I set a simple rule: highest bidder takes all. Thirty minutes later, I signed the equity transfer agreement over to our CTO.

He was brilliant and ruthless, which was exactly why Pierce had spent years trying to keep him leashed. With my shares, the CTO just became the majority shareholder.

I hoped Pierce would appreciate my wedding gift. My phone buzzed against the counter.

The wedding planner. "Harlow, what kind of game are you two playing?" She sounded done. "First the wedding is off, now it's back on." "But I already ordered my crew to dump all the custom decor into the industrial trash compactors like you asked!

What am I supposed to do at midnight?" A twinge of guilt hit me, but I wasn't the one jerking her chain. "I'm so sorry for the mess," I told her. "My wedding with him is permanently canceled.

You keep the original deposit.

If Pierce wants a wedding tomorrow, bill him for a brandnew rush order." "He's going to kill me," she muttered. "He'll pay." He wanted Piper that badly.

It was 2:00 AM by the time I hung up. I scrapped the idea of going to my mom's place to say goodbye and caught an Uber straight to an airport hotel.

A text pinged from the planner thanking me. Pierce had thrown a fit, but he wired the massive rush fee. A dry smile stretched my lips.

I set my alarm and collapsed onto the mattress. My phone instantly lit up with backtoback calls from Pierce. I blocked his number, powered the device down, and closed my eyes.

A violent pounding jolted me awake. "Harlow! Open the damn door!" Pierce. My stomach dropped. I forgot to turn off the couple's location tracking on my app.

He hammered his fist against the wood again. The image of Piper throwing herself into the glass flashed behind my eyelids. Did she actually lose the baby?

Or did the CTO already tell him about the shares? With a deafening crack, the door frame splintered. Pierce kicked it open and stormed inside. His eyes were bloodshot.

He grabbed my arm and yanked me off the bed. "Piper miscarried. The doctors had to remove her uterus because of you!

And you're just sleeping?!" I dug my heels into the carpet, fighting his grip. "I didn't push her!

She threw herself backward!" He dragged me down the hall and shoved me into the passenger seat of his car. "That was her only chance to be a mother!

Why the hell would she kill her own baby?" The locks clicked shut. He gunned the engine, blowing through red lights all the way to the hospital.

He marched me straight into Piper's room and kicked the back of my knees, forcing me onto the linoleum floor right beside her bed. "Apologize to her!" He pointed a shaking finger at my face. "And you are going to promise to carry a child for her as compensation!" Chapter 6