“Oh, God, how horrible,” Hannah says, her hand squeezing mine.
“I’ll never forget that night.” Jenna shudders, and it reminds me that her mother had been the gardener back then. They’d have seen the fire from the cottage where they were living.
“You thought Phoenix was dead?” Lucy asks.
I nod. “Yes, otherwise, he’d have come for me. He promised he’d take me away.”
Lucy arches a brow. “I can’t imagine your surprise when you saw him again.”
I close my eyes, feeling the shock and, for a moment, hope that he’d finally come for me. But he hadn’t. Instead, he hated me.
"My father told me it was my fault for getting involved with Phoenix. For years, I believed him. I believed I was responsible for killing the man I loved and his entire family."
“Oh, honey.” Hannah puts an arm around me. “That’s terrible.”
I seem to be on a roll. "Phoenix thinks I betrayed him, that I was part of my father's plan. But I would never. What we had was real. It was everything to me."
“Of course it was.” Jenna’s expression is equally as sympathetic.
“How could he think I was working with my father? Or that I wouldn’t have tried to stop him if I knew?” I take in a breath. “The fact that he does think that suggests he didn’t really know me, couldn’t have really loved me, right?”
“Oh, I don’t know. I’m sure what happened messed things up for him, but that doesn’t mean he didn’t love you then,” Lucy says, making me wonder if she’s on Phoenix’s side.
I shrug. “Ironic, really. I'm about to marry the man I once loved more than anything and who now can barely stand the sight of me and is using our marriage as revenge. God.” I pinchthe bridge of my nose with my thumb and forefinger. “If I’d accepted one of the men my father tried to marry me off to, I wouldn’t be in this situation.”
“I didn’t realize you had other opportunities to marry,” Jenna says.
“My father was always trying to push someone on me. I always sabotaged the dates so they didn’t want me. The closest I got was an older widower whose wife disappeared under questionable circumstances. He dumped me after I pretended to have a psychotic episode at his family's estate."
Lucy's eyebrows shoot up. "You didn't."
"I did.”
"Why go to such lengths?" Hannah asks.
I look down because I feel like such an idiot. All those years I grieved for Phoenix when he spent those same years planning to ruin me and my family. “Deep down, I couldn't let go of Phoenix. Even believing he was dead, I couldn't bear the thought of belonging to anyone else. My parents called me stubborn, difficult, ungrateful. It’s the only battle I’ve ever won against them."
I laugh. "And now here I am, getting exactly what I once dreamed of, marrying Phoenix Ifrinn. The universe has a twisted sense of humor, doesn't it?"
Lucy stares at me, her brows furrowed. "Wait—you never loved anyone else? In ten years?"
I wonder why that’s a big deal. "How could I? Phoenix wasThe One.”
"But you thought he was dead," Hannah says gently. "You couldn't have mourned him forever."
"Couldn't I?” I had Brigit, a piece of him. That was all I needed.
Hannah's expression shifts, a shadow crossing her face. "You know, Ash had someone before me too. Someone he loved very much."
My stomach tightens. I've heard rumors about Ash's past, about a woman who died in the same fire that took his parents.
"Her name was Meghan. She died in the fire. Like you, he spent the last ten years grieving and feeling guilty.”
The air feels suddenly thin. My father's work. My family's crime. Another life destroyed because of the Keans.
"I'm so sorry," I whisper, the words painfully inadequate.
Hannah gives me a wan smile. "I'm not telling you this to make you feel worse. I'm telling you because he found love again. He still loves and mourns Meghan, but he loves me now too. It’s different, I think, but still wonderful.”
