Ella's strength was the first thing I'd noticed about her when we'd met. Her fierceness, her confidence, and her determination to enjoy life to the fullest. I'd thought, at the time, that perhaps it had come from her innocence, that she was too young for the world to have destroyed that confidence, beaten down that happiness. But the opposite was true. Someone had stolen that innocence, beaten her down harder than anyone should have to endure, and she'd chosen that determination of happiness anyway. She'd fought not to allow him to take her life as well, to steal her happiness as he'd stolen so much from her already. And that was more a testament to her strength than anything.

I watched her now, standing at the front of the aisle next to her sister, smiling happily as Colin and Emily spoke their vows, wiping tears from her eyes as she watched them pledge themselves to one another. For a woman to have gone through what she had and still so fervently believe in love, she was remarkable, incredible. I was speechless.

The wedding was Emily's but I couldn't stop watching Ella. In her pale pink dress, reveling in the happiness of her sister. The sister who had put her beauty down her whole life without the slightest idea of what she had suffered. And yet Ella bore her no ill will. Her wealth of compassion, her penchant for forgiveness, I marveled at how lucky I was. And as I watched Colin and Emily, I couldn't help but imagine Ella and I in their place and, for the first time in a long time, marriage seemed less of a duty and more of an adventure I couldn't wait to take with her.

And yet, when the ceremony was over and we all made our way inside for the meal and the celebration, I found myself standing with the guys who were teasing Colin to no end about having given up a chance with any other woman to be with one. And yes, despite the jests, the groom himself couldn't seem any happier.

I was taking a drink of my brandy, chuckling along with a joke Elijah had just made, when I saw him entering the ballroom. I lowered my drink as he approached, hands held up in surrender.

"I was invited," Edward said. I narrowed my gaze and observed him for a moment but then nodded.

"I don't want to fight with you, uncle," I told him. "I've grown tired of it. We're family. But trust must be earned and you've got a long way to go in earning it."

Edward's lips parted in surprise and he blinked back at me as if trying to determine how this was a trap. But I just brushed past him, patting him on the back once before sidling away to where my mother stood on the edge of the ballroom, nursing her wine in front of a large window overlooking where the ceremony had been.

"The couple is beautiful," she said, gesturing with her glass to where Emily and Colin now sat at the head table, heads bowed together in laughter at some shared joke. "The wedding is a hit. You should think about having one."

She took a sip, grinning with pride at the not so subtle hint she'd just crafted. I put a hand in my pocket and pulled out the small box I'd stored away there this morning. I pulled it out and popped it open, hearing my mother gasp at the brilliant diamond ring it contained. Her hand flew to her chest and she stared from me to the ring and back, speechless.

"I bought it the day she agreed to our courtship," I told her, closing the box and putting it back into my pocket before taking another sip of my brandy. "Now, I wonder if you've seen Ella around here anywhere?"