Tied to My Best Man

When I was ten years old, the world revealed its most grotesque secret to me: I could see glowing red threads floating between people. The rule was as simple as it was merciless. A cord only formed between two people who had slept together. It wasn’t about love, romance, or longing—it was an indelible tether forged purely by the flesh, an invisible scar that neither time nor denial could erase. Over the years, I watched two separate red threads sprout from the crown of my mother’s head, each tethered to men who weren't my father. I watched my father rage, break, and swallow his pride in endless, bitter screaming matches that tore our home to pieces. Because of that, fidelity wasn't just a virtue to me; it was a matter of survival. When it came time to choose a wife, loyalty was my only non-negotiable. That was how I chose Camille. She was composed, fiercely independent, and wore an aura of untouchable reserve. Most importantly, the air above her head was completely clean. The night before our wedding, my groomsmen threw me a low-key bachelor party at an upscale lounge downtown. A few rounds in, the guys started playing phone roulette. Whoever lost the round had to surrender their unlocked phone to the table for everyone to comb through. When it came to my groomsman, Damon, he snatched his phone off the mahogany table, pressing it against his chest with a flush rising up his neck. "Skip me, man. Seriously. My girl wore me out last night, and the stuff on here isn’t fit for daylight." The guys broke into raucous laughter. Damon had been keeping his relationship shrouded in total secrecy for months—none of us had ever met her, seen a picture, or even been told her name. I smiled, opening my mouth to bail him out of the hot seat, when my breath caught in my throat. A thin, pulsing crimson cord snaked out from the top of Damon’s head. It drifted through the dim, smoky air, cut straight past the circle of my closest friends, and tied itself directly to the crown of my fiancée, Camille, who was standing right by the velvet curtains near the entrance. My vision blurred. Just last night, when she dropped me off at my apartment, her crown had been completely, immaculately bare. Thirty minutes ago, she had sent me a text: "Sam, I saved myself for twenty-five years just for you. Tomorrow night, we’re finally whole. I love you." I looked at Camille standing by the door, watching me with that familiar, tender gaze. Then I looked at Damon, who was grinning with that smug, boyish bashfulness. I reached out, picked up my glass of bourbon, and tapped the rim against his. "Damon," I said softly, my voice shockingly level. "Does your girl’s last name happen to be Sutton?" … A few drops of liquor sloshed over the rim of Damon’s glass. A flash of raw panic flickered in his eyes. "Who cares what her name is?" he stammered, recovering with a strained chuckle. "Rules are rules, but come on—" Troy, who had been my best friend since middle school, lunged across the booth to snatch the device. Damon laughed, ducking behind my shoulder to use me as a shield. "I'm serious, guys, back off. She’s got a temper. If she finds out you saw these pictures, she’ll kill me." "Look at you protecting her," Troy teased. "Who is she, royalty?" "Her situation is complicated," Damon said, his tone softening into something reverent. "She’s not ready to go public yet." As he spoke, his gaze drifted past the crowd, settling squarely on Camille by the entrance. The red thread connecting them burned like a neon wire against the dark lounge. Over the last eighteen years, I had witnessed thousands of these threads crisscrossing through crowds like dirty cobwebs. But never once had I imagined seeing one tied to the woman who was scheduled to walk down the aisle toward me in less than twelve hours. "Sam, back me up here," Damon pleaded, nudging my arm with a nervous laugh. "She really forbade me from showing anyone." I fought to keep the tremors in my wrists from reaching my fingers. Setting my glass down on the table with a dull thud, I forced a dry, razor-thin smile. "I made the rules tonight, Damon. You lose, you hand over the phone." "Damn!" Russell slammed the table. "The groom has spoken!" Damon froze for a fraction of a second, entirely unprepared for me not to offer him a graceful out. Before he could react, the soft click of heels approached. A familiar, slender hand came to rest gently on my shoulder. "All right, Sam, that’s enough," Camille said, her voice smooth and calming. "Damon’s shy. You’re the groom—don't lead the charge on bullying your best man." "Damon." She had always called him "Mr. West" or simply referred to him as "your colleague." Now, the syllables slid off her tongue with intimate ease. I stared down at the hand resting on my shoulder. Last night, this very hand had smoothed the lapels of my coat. She had wrapped her arms around my neck, holding me tight through layers of winter wool, whispering that she wanted to give her absolute, untouched self to me on our wedding night. It had been less than twenty-four hours. And now, she wore her very first crimson cord. "I'm bullying him?" I asked, turning my head slightly to look at her. "You know how intense you get when you dig your heels in," Camille smiled, reaching for a glass of cranberry juice and offering it to me. "Pre-wedding jitters are totally normal, honey. Drink something sweet." Damon took the cue, sliding smoothly behind her shoulder. "See? Camille gets me. Sam, you'd better treat her right after tomorrow. A woman this understanding? If you scare her off, you'll never find another." "You seem awfully invested in whether my fiancée runs away," I said quietly. "Just looking out for you, brother." Damon offered an easy grin, lifting his left hand to rub his neck. On his middle finger sat a brushed platinum band. My stomach plummeted into icy water. I recognized that ring. Three months ago, Camille had pulled that exact custom sketch from her notebook, tossed it into the trash can, and told me the geometric edges were too plain—that it wasn't good enough for me. Now, cast in metal, it sat snugly on Damon's hand. A flawless fit. Taking advantage of Damon’s momentary distraction, Troy hooked Damon’s wrist from behind, forced his thumb onto the biometric sensor, and clicked the screen awake. "The more you hide it, West, the more we look!" Troy cheered, flicking through the photo reel. He let out a low, appreciative whistle. The screen glowed brightly. The first picture was a candid of Damon’s profile, his eyelashes lowered, cheeks flushed pink. Just below his collarbone, trailing down beneath his unbuttoned shirt, was a constellation of dark, fresh hickeys. "Holy hell," Russell gasped, leaning in. The second photo was a tight macro shot of two hands clasped together, fingers woven tightly against a backdrop of white hotel linen. The erotic tension was suffocating. On the woman’s wrist was a vintage black-dial Omega watch. Near the bottom right edge of the bezel was a distinct, crescent-shaped nick. My nails bit into my palms until the skin nearly broke. I knew that scratch. Six months ago, Camille had accidentally slammed her wrist into a metal shopping cart while we were picking out groceries together. I had kissed the bruised skin right beside that very watch face. Troy swiped again, opening the messaging app. The contact name was saved simply as "CS", with a generic photo of a misty green meadow as the avatar. The chat history was a boundless ocean of domestic trivia—daily "good morning" texts, late-night voice calls that lasted for hours. The earliest thread dated back over a year. "Damon, I can't stop thinking about you today." "I miss you too, CS. I dreamed about you last night. Dreamed you held me until sunrise." My eyes scanned down to an exchange from three months ago. My lungs seized. Damon had written, in a tone that reeked of desperate pleading: "The symphony tonight was breathtaking. But when can we finally hold hands like that in broad daylight?" CS had replied with four words: "Soon. Just wait for me." That exact night three months ago was our seven-year anniversary. I had spent two hours styling my hair, three hours preparing a four-course dinner from scratch, and waited at the dining table for five agonizing hours. At ten-thirty that night, I finally received a text: "Still buried under Q3 reports at the firm, Sam. So sorry. Eat without me and go to bed." "Give it back! Come on, you guys are crossing a line!" Damon shouted, lunging forward to yank the phone out of Troy’s hands. His face was scarlet. Stuffing the device into his pocket, he turned on his heel and bolted toward the back stairwell. Less than two minutes after he disappeared, Camille’s phone chimed in her purse. She pulled it out, glanced at the screen, and instantly clicked it shut, plunging the glass into darkness. "My mom just texted," Camille said smoothly, turning to the table with an apologetic smile. "A couple of our out-of-town cousins just landed, and their hotel rooms got messed up. I need to go handle the front desk. You guys keep celebrating, but don't keep Sam out too late—he has to be up at six for the photographer." She leaned down and pressed a soft, lingering kiss to my cheek. The guys whistled and cheered. The moment the heavy lounge doors clicked shut behind her, I excused myself to the restroom. Instead of turning toward the stalls, I slipped into the shadows of the emergency corridor. The heavy steel fire door was cracked open a sliver, and Damon’s ragged whisper drifted through the concrete stairwell. "You promised we wouldn't do this tonight," Camille whispered back, her voice tight and hushed. "I couldn't help it," Damon choked out. "I just needed to see your face one last time." "You've seen me. Now go. We had an agreement, Damon—last night was our goodbye." Damon's tone swung between pushing her away and clinging to her, his voice cracking with misery. "Tomorrow is your wedding. I can't let Sam suspect anything. You know how he is—he’s terrified of betrayal. He sees shadows everywhere. He literally just asked me if my girl's name was Sutton." Camille let out a bitter, breathy chuckle. "So you do remember how fragile he is about loyalty." A suffocating silence fell between them, broken only by the rustle of tailored fabric sliding against concrete. "Damon... last night was a mistake," she murmured. "A mistake?" "I have to marry Sam. I owe him that much." Damon’s breathing hitched sharply. "Do you love him?" "Yes," she replied without a heartbeat of hesitation. "I've loved him since college. The deed to the townhouse is in his name, my accounts will be linked with his, and I will spend the rest of my life making sure he never feels inadequate." "Then what the hell was I to you?" "I'm sorry," Camille’s voice dropped into a register so fragile it sounded like it might shatter. "Call it weakness. Call it an obsession I couldn't control. For the past two years, you were the one beside me through every grueling merger, every late-night breakdown. Whenever you were hurting, you came to me. Whenever the pressure suffocated me, you were the only one I could breathe around. And last night... when you started crying and said we'd never touch again... I broke." There was the sound of a dull shove, like Damon had pushed her back against the railing. "If you love him so damn much, why are you standing on this staircase right now?" "Because I missed you." Three syllables. They fell between them like a sigh, yet they slammed into my chest like iron weights, obliterating seven years of absolute trust. I reached out blindly, gripping the cold steel doorframe to keep my knees from buckling. How remarkable the human heart was. A person could love me with complete, calculated certainty, and still crave another man with every fiber of her being. She had guarded her physical purity like a priceless porcelain vase, wrapped in silk, waiting to present it to me on our wedding night. But right before the grand unveiling, she had pried open the crate and handed it to Damon for a private test drive. "Camille... after tomorrow, are we really just supposed to pretend this never happened?" "We have to." "Can you really let me go?" "Even if it tears me apart, yes. Sam doesn't forgive. If he ever found out, he would walk away and never look back." "He worships the ground you walk on," Damon scoffed softly. "How could he ever abandon you?" Camille let out a quiet, knowing sigh. "Of course he won't leave me." Her absolute certainty cut deeper than the affair itself. "He’s spent six months orchestrating this wedding," she whispered. "He personally picked out every tile in that townhouse. Both of our families are already in town. He'd die before letting his mother face the humiliation of a canceled ceremony. Even if he found out, he’d smile through the reception and try to deal with it in private afterward." Damon began to weep openly. "And what about me? Did you ever stop to think about what it feels like to love you, to hold you, and then have to put on a tuxedo tomorrow, stand ten feet away as his best man, and watch you take his name?" His tears seemed to melt her. She murmured quiet, frantic reassurances against his skin. Finally, she sighed. "The smart lock code on our new townhouse is his birthday," she said. "Go over there and wait for me. Tonight... I'll give you everything you need." "Are you insane?" Damon gasped. "That’s his home. He spent weeks furnishing that place." "After sunrise, I can never hold you like this again," she said fiercely. "What if he finds out?" "He's booked into the bridal suite at the hotel with his groomsmen tonight. He has no reason to go anywhere near the house." A wet, desperate kiss echoed off the cold concrete walls. "Wait for me," she whispered. Footsteps began ascending toward the landing. I stepped silently back into the corridor, slipped into an empty bathroom stall, and slid the bolt into place. Through the thin wooden partition, I heard Damon enter. He turned on the brass faucet, splashed cold water on his face, and began humming a cheerful, upbeat tune under his breath. A second later, my phone vibrated in my palm. "Sam, I'm feeling a little under the weather, so I'm heading back early. Don't be mad at me! Rest up, and I'll see you at the altar tomorrow." Staring down at the glowing text, the corners of my mouth curled into a lifeless, hollow grin. I typed back: "Get some rest." Half an hour later, I was sitting alone inside my sedan in the cold, cavernous shadows of the hotel's underground parking garage. A notification banner flashed across the top of my phone screen: "Front Door Sensor Triggered - Living Room." The townhouse was an off-market brownstone we had bought together, securing the mortgage with our combined savings. Once the renovation was completed last week, I had secretly installed an integrated security camera in the living room ceiling to guard against package theft before we officially moved our belongings in. I hadn't even had the chance to show Camille how the mobile app worked. I tapped the screen, opening the cloud feed. The feed was crystal clear. Damon walked into the foyer without a shred of hesitation. He kicked off his boots, reached into the closet to pull out a pair of Camille's velvet guest slippers, and walked straight to the built-in bar, selecting a bottle of vintage Pinot Noir with practiced familiarity. Twenty minutes later, the front door opened again. Camille stepped inside. Damon immediately stepped into her path, wrapping his arms tightly around her waist. "It’s our last night," Damon said into her hair. "Don't say Sam's name again." "Damon, don't be childish." "Can't you grant me even that much?" Camille looked at him for a long, quiet second, then reached up, wrapping her arms around his neck from behind. "Fine. Not a word about him tonight." They kissed right there beneath the chandelier, a messy, frantic tangle of limbs that dragged from the living room rug into the hallway. The camera angle ended at the doorway of the master bedroom. Inside that room was a king-sized mattress covered in deep crimson Egyptian cotton sheets that I had spent an entire Sunday afternoon hand-steaming until there wasn't a single wrinkle. Above the headboard hung our framed gallery wall, capturing seven years of vacations, laugh lines, and promises. On the nightstand sat the vintage leather watch box she had gifted me for our engagement. Everything I had poured my heart into building had been reduced to a stage set for their final, stolen tryst. The video feed couldn't see past the bedroom frame. But it didn't need to. The glowing crimson thread in my mind’s eye had already written the ending. I thought I had hardened myself against the blow. But watching the two of them stumble across that threshold, a violent knot clamped down on my trachea. My chest hitched, starving for oxygen that wouldn't come. The tears finally spilled over, hot and heavy, splashing onto the glass screen, smearing the blurred silhouettes of the two people I had trusted most in this world. The screen timed out, turning pitch black. In the dark reflection of the glass, I caught sight of my own face. Twenty-eight years old. Exactly the same age my father had been when he discovered the truth about my mother. The only difference was that my father swallowed his pride, hid the truth, and endured thirty years of quiet rot. I wasn't going to endure a single second. Wiping the dampness from my face with the back of my sleeve, I dropped my phone into the cup holder, shifted into reverse, and slammed the accelerator, speeding toward the highway. When my father opened his front door and saw me standing on the porch under the pale porch light, the tears broke through my composure once more. "Dad," I whispered, my voice trembling. "I'm calling off the wedding." It was eleven-fifteen at night. My father had just finished watching the cloud recording on my laptop, his weathered hands shaking against the kitchen table. "Sam... the footage doesn't show them actually crossing the threshold into the bed." "Dad. The red thread," I said, looking straight into his eyes. "It’s tied between them." My father's head snapped up, his breath catching. "You saw it? Clearly?" "Crystal clear." When I was ten years old, I pointed at the woman living on the second floor and the neighbor across the hall, innocently asking my father why a bright red string connected their heads, asking if that meant they were sleeping together. My father slapped me across the face, convinced I was learning filthy slang from street kids. Six months later, both households imploded in a messy, public divorce court scandal that tore the neighborhood apart. Only then did he realize what my eyes could see. From that day on, he made me swear on my life never to speak of it to anyone. He told me that knowing what happened in other people's dark corners would only bring ruin upon my own head. He understood, better than anyone, why I had waited until twenty-eight to even consider marriage. My father closed his eyes, his chest rising and falling heavily. "The night before the ceremony. Dear God." "It didn't start last night, Dad," I said, my voice eerily calm now. "They’ve been emotionally entangled for over a year. Last night was just the night they finally knotted the string." My father sat in silence for two agonizing minutes. Then, he stood up, walked to his desk, and retrieved the master guest list. "I’ll start calling our side of the family right now," he said, his voice firming up with steel. "Every aunt, uncle, and cousin. As for the Suttons... let Camille explain it to her own blood. Sam, you're not walking down the path I took. I’ve got your back." I pulled out my phone and dialed Camille’s number. It rang seven times before the line clicked dead. Declined. Five minutes later, a text popped up. "Sam, are you back at the hotel? Go to sleep early. The photographer gets there at dawn." Staring at the casual, affectionate deceit, I typed back: "Where are you?" The typing bubble danced at the top of the chat, disappearing and reappearing for two full minutes. Finally, she sent an image of our townhouse's guest bedroom, the duvet neatly turned down. "Finished helping the relatives get settled, but the hotel was completely booked out. Rather than driving all the way back to my place, I crashed in our guest room for the night." It was a masterpiece of a lie. Seamless, practical, unassailable. If it weren't for the supernatural cord floating above her head, if it weren't for the hidden lens nestled in the ceiling trim, I would have spent this moment feeling sick with guilt, marveling at how exhausted my sweet, hardworking bride must be. Without typing a single word of explanation, I sent her a screen grab from the living room feed. The frame clearly captured Damon’s groomsman tuxedo casually draped over the back of our designer sofa. Underneath the picture, I sent one final message: "You two don't have to sneak around anymore. The wedding is canceled. Let's give both our families the courtesy of a clean, quiet exit." Camille never replied. One minute later, the live feed flickered on my laptop screen. Camille stormed out of the master bedroom, her silk robe disheveled, glaring straight up into the corner where the tiny red sensor blinked. Damon trailed behind her, clutching my plush monogrammed bathrobe around his waist, his face white with terror. "What do we do? Did he see? Did he see everything?" Camille reached up, her expression cold and calculated, and yanked the power cable from the wall. Right before the screen plunged into static, her icy voice echoed through the speaker: "Stop panicking. I'll handle it." The next morning, as the first gray light of dawn bled through the clouds, it became abundantly clear what her idea of "handling it" entailed: She was going to drag me to the altar by force. At six in the morning, Camille sent an urgent blast to our wedding party chat, claiming I had suffered a sudden, severe bout of food poisoning with a 104-degree fever, and that the morning bridal pickup was officially scrapped. Meanwhile, her father, Robert Sutton, arrived at the hotel with a dozen burly uncles and cousins, barricading the hallway outside my bridal suite. "Samuel! Open this damn door right now!" Robert’s voice boomed through the corridor. "A groom trying to back out on the morning of? That’s fraud! That’s an insult to my family!" "If you don't step out of that room this instant, I will make sure every firm in this city knows you had a psychotic break on your wedding day! Good luck ever finding a woman to look at you again!" Camille stood right behind her father in the hotel hallway. She didn't utter a single word to stop him. She simply stepped closer to the peephole, her voice low and composed: "Sam. Put on your tuxedo. I'm taking you to the venue. Once the ceremony is over, you can punish me however you want." My groomsmen, waking up in their adjoining suites to my cancellation text only to find me missing from the hotel entirely, stumbled into the hallway and caught the Sutton family waging war against an empty room. Troy immediately sent me the surreptitious video he had recorded on his phone. Watching the footage on my father’s living room sofa, a bitter chill settled into my bones. I had offered her an out. I had tried to let us dismantle this trainwreck with some semblance of dignity behind closed doors. But she had chosen violence. She was relying on the social clout and aggressive dominance of the Sutton family to force me to swallow this venom and smile for the cameras. I dialed Camille’s number directly. "Tell your father to stop harassing my friends," I said the second she answered. "I will be at the cathedral at eleven sharp." I walked over to the guest closet, reaching for the garment bag I hadn't touched in two years. Inside was the matte-black three-piece suit I had worn to my uncle’s funeral. I pulled it on, adjusted a wide-brimmed black fedora over my brow to cast a heavy shadow over the hollow, dark circles beneath my sleepless eyes, and walked out the door with my father beside me. When we stepped into the private reception foyer of the venue, Robert Sutton was standing beside the welcome table, collecting gift envelopes. The moment he saw me dressed entirely in mourning black, his hands froze mid-air. Camille rushed toward me, her silk wedding gown trailing behind her, reaching out to grab my wrist. "Sam, stop this nonsense," she hissed under her breath. "I brought your ivory tuxedo. Go into the green room and change right now." I pulled my arm back, leaving her fingers grasping at empty air. "Where's Damon?" I asked. "He's... he fell ill this morning." "Exhausted from last night's workout?" Robert lunged forward, shoving me violently in the chest. "Watch your filthy mouth! On the happiest day of your life, you have the nerve to throw dirt on my daughter's character?" My lower back collided hard against the sharp corner of the oak registry table. A bolt of white-hot agony shot up my spine, forcing me to double over. "Don't you lay a hand on him!" my father roared, charging across the marble floor. Before he could reach me, Camille's cousin and maternal uncle stepped in, shoving my father roughly against the wall. "Your son is deliberately trying to drag the Sutton name through the mud!" Robert leaned down, his index finger nearly poking into my eye. "You either stand up, put on that white suit, and walk down that aisle like a man, or you get down on your knees right now and beg my entire family for forgiveness!" Camille stepped between us, catching my elbow. "Dad, please, back off. Don't make a scene." "You're still defending this punk?" Robert snarled. "He's my husband," Camille said firmly, tightening her grip on my arm. I let out a harsh, dry bark of laughter, straightening my back despite the throb in my spine. "We haven't signed the marriage license, Camille. You are nothing to me." Her fingers dug through the wool of my black jacket, her eyes flashing with desperation. "Sam, stop this theatrics. I admit I crossed a line last night. Once the guests leave, I will make it up to you, I swear to God—" "You still think this is a negotiation?" I asked, staring dead into her eyes. Camille looked at me, a flicker of genuine, uncomprehending frustration surfacing on her face. "Are you really going to throw away seven years of devotion over one single, momentary lapse in judgment?" Before I could answer, the grand brass doors to the ballroom swung wide. The brassy, romantic notes of Wagner's bridal chorus poured into the foyer, followed by the booming voice of the officiant over the sound system: "Ladies and gentlemen, please rise for the entrance of the bride!" The guests inside erupted into enthusiastic applause. Camille swallowed, wiped the tension from her expression with terrifying speed, fixed a radiant, breathtaking smile onto her face, and glided through the double doors. Inside, the venue was a breathtaking sea of imported white lilies, cascading crystal chandeliers, and warm, cinematic amber spotlights. As the music transitioned into the majestic march, the officiant’s voice echoed proudly through the vaulted ceiling: "And now, let us welcome our groom!" Dressed from head to toe in funeral black, looking like a widower arriving at a burial, I walked down the aisle of the wedding I had spent half a decade dreaming of. Near the altar stood Damon. He was wearing his tailored charcoal groomsman suit, his eyes red and puffy, the brushed platinum band gleaming brightly under the stage lights. The moment he saw me approach, tears welled in his eyes. He stepped forward, his voice a frantic, tearful whisper: "Sam, thank God you made it. Last night... I was just in a dark place and Camille was nice enough to bring me a drink. Please don't misinterpret things, we swear to God nothing happened..." He reached out his trembling hands, pretending to straighten my nonexistent black necktie. The officiant beamed, gesturing for the bride to take her place beside the groom. Camille walked toward me, composed and glowing, acting as though the morning's hostility had never occurred. She reached for my hand. Instead of taking it, I pivoted on my heel, reached out, seized Damon by the lapels of his tuxedo jacket, and hurled him violently across the marble platform. With a sharp yelp, Damon crashed hard onto the floor, tumbling directly at Camille's feet. The room gasped. The music cut out with a violent screech of feedback. Hundreds of well-dressed guests froze in stunned, suffocating silence. Ignoring the rising murmurs, I stepped off the altar and walked directly to the sound engineer's booth. Pulling my phone from my pocket, I plugged the lightning cable into the master HDMI feed. "Roll the screen," I told the terrified technician. A massive 4K projector screen hummed as it lowered over the floral archway. Seconds later, the cloud footage from our townhouse living room illuminated the entire room. The banquet hall fell into a silence so absolute you could hear the ice melting in the champagne buckets. First came Damon, unlocking the front door, slipping into Camille’s velvet slippers. Then came Camille, gliding through the entrance. Then the embrace. The desperate, hungry kiss on the designer rug. Damon's tuxedo jacket being stripped off and flung across our sofa. And finally, the two of them stumbling together past the doorframe of our master bedroom. The video paused on that empty, dimly lit hallway. I picked up the master wireless microphone, my voice ringing clear and steady through the speakers: "The wedding is officially canceled. Because last night, in the home we bought to raise our children in, my bride gave herself to my best man." Damon suddenly scrambled to his feet, letting out a wild, breathless laugh. "You can't even see our faces!" He pointed frantically at the paused screen, addressing the paralyzed tables. "It’s a fake! Don't listen to him! The camera angle never catches the front of our faces! Sam majored in digital media and advertising—he’s an expert in video editing! He used an AI deepfake template to fabricate this whole thing because he wanted an excuse to breach the marriage contract!" At the VIP corporate table, Camille’s managing director, Erica Morrison, stood up, adjusting her designer glasses. "Samuel, listen to reason. In the professional world, you cannot convict a person's character based on an ambiguous, low-res home clip without clear facial identification." Camille's aunt slammed her palm against the linen tablecloth. "Exactly! The profiles are blurry! For all we know, the man in that video is you, Samuel!" Camille's cousin jumped to his feet, sneering toward the stage. "Unbelievable! What kind of sick bastard creates an AI sex tape of his own fiancée? Did you blow through her family's trust fund and make this up to cover your theft?" Accusation after accusation rained down from the Sutton tables like stones. Camille walked briskly toward the sound booth, stopping three feet from me, extending an open hand. "Delete the master file, Sam. If you delete it right now, I won't press charges for public defamation." Robert Sutton marched down the center aisle, snatched the officiant's microphone, and bellowed at the crowd: "You all see what kind of unhinged sociopath we're dealing with! The Sutton family will not be slandered by a coward looking for an exit!" He turned his glare toward me. "The seventy-thousand-dollar wedding contribution my family gave you? You will repay it double!" "Every penny spent on this venue, this catering, and the floral arrangements will be billed to the Dawson family!" "And you will draft a signed, public confession apologizing for this smear campaign against my daughter's honor!" I stood behind the mixing console, looking out over Robert, Camille, and the sea of indignant faces staring back at me. And that was when I looked at the air above their heads. Dozens upon dozens of bright, pulsing crimson threads stretched out from their crowns, weaving together into a dense, filthy spiderweb that blanketed the entire ballroom. The aunt who had just accused me of lying had a thread that stretched directly to the venue's banquet sales manager standing by the door. The cousin shouting about trust funds had a thread that cut diagonally across three tables, tying directly into the head of his best friend’s seated wife. And Robert Sutton—the righteous patriarch defending his daughter's spotless purity—had a thick, vibrant red cord trailing stra