Free The Wedding Song by Lucy Kevin Page A

have spent the week pretending the talent show didn’t matter, but Whitney knew he was nervous.
    Not as nervous as she’d been for most of the week, however, as she’d told her relatives about Kenneth, one by one.
    Her brother had been easy to tell, because Whitney knew he wasn’t going to judge her. Annette had been easy, too. The hardest part was stopping her cousin from continuing to suggest other men to date to take her mind off the “pain” of losing Kenneth. It had taken a good quarter of an hour to persuade Annette that “we both decided to end it” was not code for Kenneth having run off with someone else.
    Her parents had been the hardest ones to tell. She’d put it off all week, expecting her mother to cry and her father to say how disappointed he was in her for letting a good man like Kenneth go. The last thing that Whitney had wanted was to hurt them.
    Despite her fears, her parents had actually been great. Once she’d finally managed to get the words out, her mother had hugged her. Her father had asked her if she was sure it was what she wanted, and when she said yes, he’d seemed almost relieved.
    “All we want is for you to be happy, honey,” he’d said. “I’m glad you realized this now, before you and Kenneth got married.”
    “We’ve always liked him,” her mother had added, “but if the two of you don’t have that spark, then you obviously aren’t right for one another. I know one day you’ll find someone who will make you truly happy.”
    It had been surprisingly easy to tell them the truth. So much easier than Whitney had thought it would be. So easy that sitting there in the darkening auditorium, she found herself wondering if she couldn’t tell her parents the rest of it, that she wasn’t sure she wanted to spend her life running their company.
    Only, the truth was that resigning as head of operations of the Banning Group would affect everything. And Whitney couldn’t possibly forget the conversation she’d overheard five years ago.
     
     
    “I don’t know what we’re going to do now that Whitney has decided to go to veterinary college,” her father had said.
    “You aren’t thinking of staying at the company, are you Graham?” her mother had replied. “You know what the doctor said about stress and your health.”
    “I don’t know what else I can do, Jen. Whitney’s the only one I trust to take over. Could you imagine one of her cousins doing it?”
    “We could recruit someone else to take your place, someone who has been in the business for a while already. Your health isn’t good enough to put in those long days anymore.”
    “I won’t have a stranger running the family business.”
    “But if Whitney doesn’t want to do it…”
    Her father’s face in the shadows had been resolved. “Then I have to keep going.”
     
     
    Had anything really changed since then? Whitney wondered, as the last few people came in to the auditorium.
    No, it hadn’t.
    After thirty years behind a desk her father had been pale. Too thin. He traveled too much and didn’t eat right. As soon as she’d taken over, his health had improved. Now when he traveled it was for pleasure. And he was full of laughter whenever they were together. She loved knowing she’d been there for him the way he’d been there for her her whole life.
    Her parents still wouldn’t want a stranger running the business they had worked so hard to build up. So who did that leave? Sebastian in a few years, after he graduated from college?
    Whitney looked up at the stage and knew her brother’s heart was in music, not running an international corporation.
    The reserved seat next to her was the only empty one in the room. Just as the lights went all the way down, a man sat down beside her. Whitney couldn’t help staring, her pulse speeding up automatically, her breath coming fast.
    “Tyce? What are you doing here?”
    Even in the dark auditorium, she could see he looked particularly good tonight, wearing a