To Love and to Promise by Rachel Ann Nunes

Author:Rachel Ann Nunes [Nunes, Rachel Ann]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Romance
ISBN: 978-1-939203-22-9
Publisher: White Star Press
Published: 2010-03-15T00:00:00+00:00

Chapter Nineteen

As Brionney had heard, the sealing cancellation request included not only a letter from her and Jesse, but also a letter from Derek. Brionney and Jesse wrote theirs quickly and then waited for Derek. Weeks passed, and the letter never arrived. Brionney knew he had received the request because she had sent a registered letter to the address Derek’s lawyer had given Max.

“I can’t believe he won’t send it,” Brionney said to Jesse. She had a growing feeling of unease that Derek would never make anything easy for her.

“Maybe he doesn’t want to break the sealing.”

“He’ll have to.”

In desperation, Brionney called Debbie. “Don’t worry, I’m on it,” she said. “I’ll just take a little trip out to his house.”

Debbie called back the next day. “I’ve got the letter! I stayed at the fancy new condo he and Melinda live in until he wrote it. He didn’t want to be bothered, but when Melinda learned it was so you could remarry and he could stop paying alimony, she invited me to dinner. I was there until nearly eleven o’clock. I think Derek wrote the letter simply to get rid of me. To tell you the truth, I had to practically tell him what to write.”

“I love you, Debbie.” Brionney looked heavenward, sending a silent prayer of thanks.

“What are friends for? Just don’t forget to invite me to the wedding.”

The hard part taken care of, Brionney settled back to wait for her bishop to send the papers to Salt Lake and for them to grant the cancellation. She eagerly planned her wedding and reception with her mother and sisters. The remaining months passed quickly.

Two weeks before their wedding, the bishop called them into his office. “I’m sorry, but I have bad news. The papers aren’t here yet. I called Salt Lake to see what was going on, and they can’t find them. In fact, no one has any record that we even sent them. I don’t know what else to tell you.”

Brionney was stunned. “I thought you said we’d have plenty of time.”

“I thought so,” he said, “given the circumstances of your divorce. I’ve never seen it take this long. I guess it got hung up on someone’s desk and misfiled. I’m really sorry. We can file the request again, but you know what that entails. We’ll have to get another letter from your ex-husband.”

“But we’ve got the invitations, the flowers, the dresses, everything is planned.” Brionney felt close to tears. She wanted to cry and yell and scream, but she squashed the feelings as she had done so often where Derek was concerned.

“The only option would be to get married civilly and then be sealed later,” the bishop said kindly. “But would it be so terrible to wait until, say, February? I know how much this means to you both to start things off right.”

“It took so much for us to get Derek to write a letter in the first place,” Brionney managed to say, her voice shaking. “I don’t know if I can get him to do it again.

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