The Ladies of the Secret Circus by Constance Sayers (the little red hen ebook TXT) 📕

was in them—really in them, not just the pretend exterior sheen. If anyone would know whether Todd Sutton was on his way to the church or in the next state by now, it was Audrey. “Do you see anything?”

Her mother simply shook her head. “Nothing.”

Yet Lara knew that her mother was lying. Why? “What aren’t you telling me?”

“Nothing,” said her mother, nearly snapping at her. “Lara, I see nothing.”

“Nothing?” Lara dramatically looked down at her dress. “Really, Mother?”

“I don’t see him, Lara.” Audrey looked stricken. “I’m sorry.”

That was impossible. Her mother could see everything. Each transgression Todd had ever made, Audrey smelled on him, like a dog.

“What does that mean?”

“I don’t know.” Her mother’s voice was low now.

In hearing those words—I don’t know—something in Lara shifted. The whole place began to sour. She tried to breathe, but the corset in the damned dress stopped her lungs from expanding. She grabbed at the bodice, but it wouldn’t move. Lara concentrated and began to enchant the zipper, feeling her ribs relax as the fabric released. Looking up, she spied Caren Jackson, her maid of honor, standing in the doorway in her lavender taffeta dress, her mouth agape as she watched her friend’s wedding gown appear to unzip itself with invisible hands.

Lara’s knees buckled and she stumbled into the Baby Jesus doll in his cradle shoved against the wall. Caren pulled her back up, placing her in the regular-size teacher’s chair. Lara began to pluck the baby’s breath sprigs from Caren’s updo, first just the strand that was too close to Caren’s dark-brown eyes, but then another cluster near her ear.

“Fuck the baby’s breath,” said Caren, who began tugging at the other sprigs, pulling them out.

Somehow, this absurd gesture made Lara laugh. This situation was ridiculous, really it was. She needed to get herself together. She put her head down almost between her knees to avoid fainting. “What should I do?”

Caren had been her best friend since their morning kindergarten class. They’d sat together in the tiny chairs in this room as children. Caren crouched down and met her eyes. “I honestly don’t know, but we’ll figure this out.”

“How could he—?”

Caren simply shook her head.

A few minutes later, Fred crept upstairs and whispered to her mother, just loud enough for her to hear. “I don’t think he’s coming.”

“We need to get her out of here.” Audrey grabbed her hand. “Now.”

Lara and her mother managed the stairs down to the foyer one step at a time, her father two steps behind them. For the first time in her life, Lara used the handrail. The church door opened. Her heart leapt, hoping it was Todd. Instead, Chet Ludlow, Todd’s best man, muscled through the doors, his face red. The first thing Lara thought was that he’d gotten a terrible haircut for this ceremony and that the pictures would look terrible. And then she remembered, and her stomach lurched. The wedding pictures. There would be many more moments like this in her future, cruel reminders of what didn’t happen today. Her world was about to change to “before” and “after.”

He seemed surprised to find a clump of people standing in the foyer. He turned to Lara. “I’ve been out looking for him for the last half hour. I swear I have.”

“And?” It was Caren, her voice firm.

Chet furiously shook his head. “I can’t find him anywhere.”

Satisfied he was telling the truth, Lara nodded and pushed through the Gothic wooden double doors with a strength she didn’t know she had. As she stepped outside, through a cruel twist, the sun was now peeking around a soft cloud.

Hearing steps on the pavement below, Lara looked down to see Ben Archer, Kerrigan Falls’ chief of police. He was out of breath, his uniform rising and falling as if he’d been out for a hard run.

In this humiliating and intimate moment, she’d hoped to avoid seeing anyone, let alone a perfect stranger, but their eyes met and she could see that he, too, had nothing to report.

There would be no wedding today.

Kerrigan Falls, Virginia

October 10, 2004

With his phone on vibrate, it took Ben Archer a minute to comprehend the sound he was hearing until it traveled off the nightstand and onto the wood floor, clacking like a child’s windup toy. That woke him up.

Sweeping his hand under the bed, he retrieved it just as it went to voicemail. Damn. It was Doyle Huggins, his deputy. He hated these new mobile phones. The idea that he was now tethered round-the-clock to Doyle was nearly unbearable. He hit the redial. “It’s six A.M., Doyle.” His voice was low even though he was alone.

“I know. I thought you’d want to know right away. They’d found a car about an hour ago—Todd Sutton’s car.”

He felt a lump in his throat. “Are you sure?”

“Oh yeah,” said Doyle. “It’s his car all right.”

“What about Sutton?” Yesterday Ben had been out looking for the runaway groom for hours.

“No sign of him yet, but I’m looking.”

“Where are you?”

“That’s the fucked-up part.” Doyle seemed hesitant to speak. “I’m standing in the middle of Wickelow Bend.”

Ben inhaled sharply. “I’ll be right there.”

He slid out of the warm bed and got dressed quickly. Grabbing coffee at the 7-Eleven, Ben drove across the Shumholdt Bridge with its dramatic view of Kerrigan Falls’ hundred-foot drop.

Seventy minutes southwest of Washington, DC, Kerrigan Falls was named for the wild and winding Kerrigan River that flowed south another sixty miles. Famous for its large rocks and fallen trees that crossed the small gorge like Pixy Stix, the Kerrigan River ran parallel to the Blue Ridge Mountains that loomed above the town’s tiny skyline.

At the entrance of both wine and horse country, Kerrigan Falls was surrounded by the lush and humid rolling hills of the Virginia countryside with their old horse farms and new vineyards. In the past ten years, tourists had begun to flock to the area for its quaint downtown, buying up old farms, opening antiques shops and vintage bookstores.