Page 43 of Amelia and Her Prince Charming
Holding hands for the rest of the night.
“I’m right about to do something—”
“It won’t take long,” Gage said. “It’s really important.”
I tore my gaze away from Amelia to look at them. They both wore serious expressions. “Is Dylan alright?”
“Yeah,” Gage said, but Bret shook his head. I looked back and forth at them and waited for an explanation. “It’s better if we show you,” Bret finally said.
I glanced at Amelia, who gave me a questioning look. I shrugged and followed them away from the park and into the wooded area behind the shops along Main Street.
Chapter 25
Amelia
Everyonewasstartingtotake their seats for dinner, and I looked around the park for Hudson. He’d disappeared several minutes ago with Bret and Gage, and I hadn’t seen them come back yet. I couldn’t get enough of watching him. He was so handsome, it almost hurt to look at him during the wedding. His eyes teared up when Rosie and Dylan said their vows, and when they’d kissed, Hudson's searing gaze had met mine, making me feel like I was on fire from the inside.
I made my way over to my assigned table, and when I went to sit down, there was an envelope on my seat.
Someone had writtenAmeliaacross the front of it, two lines drawn under my name.
None of the other seats had letters on them. I opened it, and pulled out a hand-written note.
Dear Amelia,
I can listen no longer in silence. I must speak to you. You pierce my soul. I am half agony, half hope. Tell me I’m not too late. I haveloved no one but you. For you alone, I think and plan. I can hardly write. You are too good! Too excellent!
Yours ever,
Hudson
PS. Please meet me in the wooded area behind Icy Asps restaurant when you read this.
I read it a second time, my confusion growing.
First of all, this wasn’t Hudson’s handwriting. This was messy and imprecise, while Hudson wrote as though he held a ruler under each line of words. I’d seen his handwriting hundreds of times when we were in college, and it was something I used to tease him about.
Secondly, this letter was totally ripped off from Jane Austen’sPersuasion. These were Captain Wentworth’s words, not Hudson’s. Sure, it was shortened and up to date, but I’d know that letter anywhere.
I set the letter in my lap and looked around the room in earnest for some clue as to what in the world was going on. No one was at my table yet, so I stood, still clutching the letter.
Was it dumb to go behind Icy Asps and see who it was?
Probably.
I caught Rosie’s gaze, and she smiled widely and expectantly at me. She bustled away from the person who’d been talking to her and came up to my side to give me another huge hug. We’d already spoken after the ceremony, where she told me we’d accidentally decorated the wrong car. Turned out her brothers had rented a white SUV, not black. Whoops.
“What’s that?” she asked, pointing to the letter in my hand.
“It’s so weird.” I handed it to her, and her eyes skimmed over it, brightening as she got to the end.
“Hudson wrote this? That’s so sweet.”
I shook my head. “Hudson didn’t write that.”
“That’s his name.” She pointed to the scrawled signature. “You have to meet him.”
“Rosie. It’s clearly a trap of some kind.”
