Copyright © 2020 by Paul Watson All Rights Reserved. This Book Or Any
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Copyright © 2020 by Paul Watson All rights reserved. This book or any portion thereof may not be reproduced or used in any manner whatsoever without the express written permission of the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review. This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental. paulwatsonbooks.com The Missing Wedding A short thriller Paul Watson Chapter 1 Polly Park woke at dawn as the June light pierced the thin curtains. She stumbled from her bed and lowered the blind, but her head throbbed, and she fell back onto the mattress. The sheets were crisp and the pillows plump; she pulled the duvet over her head and sank into a dream. Her fiancé, Mike, relaxed in a hot tub filled with custard as she dangled on a bungee cord over him. She dipped her finger into the bath and took a taste. ‘Hey, you can’t taste my bathwater until we’re married, Polly Park.’ Mike said in protest. ‘Don’t be such a prude Mike, it's not like I’m in the bath with you. Tomorrow I’ll be able to join you though.’ ‘I’m looking forward to life with you Polly Park, there’s plenty room in here.’ Polly reached towards the tub, but it slipped away from her on rails. The bath sped up like a crazy rollercoaster ride. Mike waved as the distance between him, and his future wife increased. A single tear rolled down his cheek. Polly reached up to the ties that bound her feet to the bungee cord, desperate to free herself and run along the track towards Mike. Her hands got tangled, and she struggled to free her arms. She wrenched and twisted and fought the bedsheets, and duvet until she woke covered in sweat. She shouted, ‘Mike!’ Darkness surrounded Polly, and this time she floundered to the window to reverse the blind. The sash window stuck, and she jiggled it a little and then forced it upwards. As she inhaled the morning air, she detected a trace of honeysuckle: not the heady smell of dusk but still a noticeable trace. The familiar smell shocked Polly as her eyes cleared. She’d expected to look out into the yard beneath her dismal London flat, but she saw the gardens of her family home and the fragrant borders planted by her father before his death. Polly could not remember travelling to her mum’s house; she couldn’t remember anything. Her headache pounded as she checked the date on her phone: 10:00 am June 27th. The date seemed familiar and Polly realised it was her wedding day. Not her anniversary, but the day she would marry Mike Harvey right here at her family home. Polly thought hard and tried to recollect her last memory. She’d finished work at the hospital on a Thursday late shift and met her friends Phoebe and Sarah in their usual bar. Sarah had insisted on a secondary hen night for just the three of them and phoebe had made sure it was two nights before the wedding before they’d all travel together on the Friday. Polly glanced in the mirror as she threw on her dressing gown and checked the two-guest rooms near her own off the upper landing. Her mum’s had made up neat rooms with her usual lofty standard of housekeeping when expecting guests. Folded towels sat on ironed duvet covers amongst the aroma of fabric conditioner. Recent magazines lay on the nightstands and cushions towered so high that they reached the top of the headboard. She then headed to her mother’s room and rapped on the door before pushing it open a little. Her mum had tidied the room, but not to the same standard as the others. A bookmark flopped from the novel beside the bed next to an empty cup. ‘Mum?’ Polly called into the room. No reply came so Polly entered and peaked into the bathroom but found no trace of her mother. A search of the downstairs yielded no positive result and so Polly showered and dressed in clothes from an overnight bag she had no memory of packing. She found painkillers in the kitchen cabinet and sat in an armchair with a mug of coffee. Polly reflected that by this time the place should buzz with activity. Phoebe had booked make-up and hairdressers to arrive and caterers, which made Polly remember the marquee. She trotted out the front door into the courtyard and roused the two dogs who lived in the porch. Bozer and Tasha joined her as she rounded the driveway to the front lawn where the marquee for the reception should have stood. The lawn was empty and lush, and the dogs looped as Polly wondered what had happened. She recalled speaking to her mum on Thursday morning who had said the erectors would be along on Friday to get the venue ready. Polly called her mum and then Phoebe and then Sarah, but it went straight to voicemail every time. She hesitated before calling Mike. Polly reasoned that it wouldn’t bring poor luck to speak to him on the morning of her wedding day under the circumstances. Polly dialled and breathed as Mike’s phone rang. It rang six times before the voicemail kicked in, and she left a message. It took an effort for her to keep composed. ‘Hi Mike, Polly here. I’m at my mum’s house and there’s nobody here. I think I’ve got the Amnesia again Mike, I can’t remember passed Thursday. Please call me when you get the message. I love you.’ Polly waited until she’d hung up the call before she cried. The smiling faces of Bozer and Tasha soothed her, and she gathered herself. She’d sworn never to get too drunk again after she’d suffered memory loss the previous year and she’d turned sown Sarah’s requests for late nights. Polly could not believe that she’d blacked out again through alcohol on Thursday night, but she’d surprised herself before and didn’t rule it out. She hoped Mike would ring back soon and sat on the bench on the empty lawn as the dogs chased a pigeon. Chapter 2 Polly made coffee in the kitchen and waited for her phone to ring, but it remained silent for the next hour. She saw her mother’s elaborate wedding invitation sitting on the kitchen sideboard and checked it for the date:27th June. Today. The care her mother had taken in preparing the design of the invitations gave Polly an idea. She found the wedding binder and placed it on the kitchen table. The binder contained all her mother’s correspondence on wedding planning. Polly and Mike had been more than happy to hand over control to Mrs Park. Polly had even allowed for her mum to use her trust fund to pay for the wedding. Having eschewed her parent’s wealth all her life, Polly had promised her father long ago that she would let her mother spend this money; she owed him that and a lot more. The black folder contained invoices from the caterers, musicians, florists and the marquee company amongst others. Polly called a few of the numbers but got recorded messages that the office hours were 9-5. The marquee company had a mobile number, and a guy answered after a few rings. ‘Hello, Its Polly Park here, I think we booked you for my wedding today?’ ‘I don’t think so, we’re down in Surrey today at wedding for the Fosters. That’s nothing to do with you is it?’ ‘No, please check and see if you’ve got a booking for Polly Park and Mike Harvey.’ ‘Will do, I’ll look through the bookings. Sorry, no bookings for that name. We’ve got it all on a database here, you must have the wrong company, Sorry.’ Polly finished her third coffee and her head felt better. She looked at the picture of her with her brother Toby as teenagers near the elm tree. Her mother had reframed it and replaced the smashed glass. It was around two years now since the police arrested Toby for the murder of their father and the attempted murder of her and Mike. She’d visited him while he waited on remand, but she’d stayed away after the jury convicted him and the judge handed a life sentence. Polly’s mum told her she could not visit as well and that she could never forgive her son. Looking at the photo, Polly wondered whether this was true or if it was how her mother wished she felt. By noon, Polly tired of waiting for the phone to ring and returned to her flat in London and look for clues. She’d normally get the train, but she needed independence right now and opened the roller shutter doors on the garage, hoping to see her mum’s fiat 500 parked on the slab. There was no Fiat, but a car stood polished and prepped with keys in. Her father’s red Ferrari 328 gleamed and the morning sun glinted from its grill. Polly’s remembered her father buying his toy in the late eighties when she was eight years old.