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her new husband, to see what he thought about what Dennis had done.
    His brown eyes had darkened and looked stark, but he managed a smile. “I hope Dennis didn’t embarrass you. We’ve been friends all our lives.”
    “Not at all,” Hetty said, aware that she was lying to her husband only moments after their marriage.
    Hetty turned to Grace, who was standing beside her, and saw the girl scowling at Dennis. Hetty realized that she’d better do something quick, or Grace was liable to say something to make matters worse. She turned her gaze back to Karl and asked, “What comes next?”
    Dennis laughed and slapped his friend on the back. “She wants to know what comes next, Karl.”
    Hetty saw the embarrassed flush on Karl’s face at his friend’s teasing and said, “I meant, is there something we need to sign, now that the ceremony’s over?”
    Karl cleared his throat. “The church register.”
    The register showed Henrietta Wentworth Templeton had married Karl Frederick Norwood. Hetty refused to worry about whether the marriage was legal when she hadn’t used her real last name. The point was, they’d said the words before God. She was married all right.
Till death us do part.
    “What happens now?” Griffin asked.
    Dennis laughed and winked at Hetty again. “The honeymoon, of course.”
    Griffin snorted, turned to Karl, and said, “I mean, what happens to us? Me and Grace? Are we your kids now, or what?”
    “Yes, you are,” Karl replied as he settled a white woolen shawl, his wedding gift to Hetty, over her shoulders.
    Hetty was wearing the white silk-and-lace wedding gown Mrs. Templeton had brought with her, which Mr. Lin, who’d turned out to be pretty good with a needle, had altered for her during their last week on the trail. Karl’s gift, the shawl, had been delivered to her hotel room after he’d escorted her there.
    As Mr. Lin draped the shawl around Hetty’s shoulders before they left for the church, Grace had remarked that she really appreciated Hetty marrying Karl, especially when he wasn’t much to look at.
    Mr. Lin had stepped in front of Hetty, looked up at her with his dark, inscrutable eyes, and said in a quiet voice, “Confucius say: ‘Everything have beauty. Not everyone see it.’ ”
    Hetty had pondered that thought ever since. She glanced at her brand-new husband, looking for the beauty Mr. Lin had suggested was there somewhere. She didn’t see it.
    “I’m hungry,” Griffin said. “When do we eat?”
    “Right now,” Karl replied. “I’ve got dinner planned at the hotel.”
    “I wish I could join you,” Dennis said, “but there’s some business that needs to get finished if we’re going to leave for the Bitterroot first thing tomorrow morning.” He grinned at Karl. “Or rather, whenever the two of you are up and ready to get moving.”
    Hetty watched her husband flush again at such a blatant reference to the fact that Karl might want to linger in bed the morning after his wedding. She couldn’t believe Dennis was abandoning his best friend on his wedding day—for business. Worst of all, she couldn’t imagine sitting through a dinner at the hotel alone with Karl. Or rather, alone with Karl and Grace and Griffin.
    “You married good now, Boss,” Mr. Lin said.
    Hetty had forgotten about the Chinaman, who’d come to the church and sat in a back pew to watch the ceremony.
    Mr. Lin focused on Hetty, then Karl, and said, “Confucius say: ‘Whatever you do, do with whole heart.’ ”
    Easy for him to say, Hetty thought bleakly. He wasn’t the one who’d just given up any hope of ever having that fairy tale ending. On the other hand, she was entirely responsible for ruining her chance at finding love and happily ever after, so what did it matter who she married? She was getting exactly what she deserved.
    Karl’s brown eyes crinkled at the corners as he smiled. “That seems like easy advice for a newly married man to take.” He put a hand on Bao’s shoulder