"Don't do this, Audrey," he begged. "I'll get you out of here. I'll protect you from" —he shot a disgusted glare at the nave doors as if he could see my father waiting on the other side to walk me down the aisle— "all of it. Whatever it is, I can help you. Just come with me now.Please."
I stared at the floor. The glow of the stained glass soaked it in deep, vivid red. It made me think about the old stories of altars and virgin sacrifices. Wasn't that why I was here? To be sacrificed? My parents wouldn't find any humor in that. I wasn't sure I did either.
Still, it was nowhere near the darkest thought I'd had today. "If you've ever loved me at all, you'd leave and stay away."
I was proud of myself for keeping my voice steady. For not bursting into tears. For not gathering up my skirts and running away, no matter the devastating cost. For standing here with a hole in my chest and my still-beating heart in hand.
"I can't believe you're saying this," he whispered.
"Then don't," I said. "But you have to leave. Now."
I held his gaze as he shook his head at me, more disappointed than ever, and watched him storm through the front doors without a backward glance. The impact of it was subtle, a fatal wound I wouldn't notice until the adrenaline wore off and there was nothing left to be done about it.
I was still fixated on those doors when my father appeared beside me. He made a wet, congested sound but I didn't acknowledge him. I couldn't. Not after sending Jude away like that. If he didn't hate me yet, he would now.
"Let's get on with it," my father said.
He gave the old, heavy doors a pointed stare as if he could see straight through them. A motorcycle engine revved on the street outside. I knew that sound the same as I knew my own heartbeat.
My father made another thick, rattling noise in his throat. "You wouldn't be forgetting our agreement now, would you?"
Tears filled my eyes as I shook my head. As if I could forget.
I dropped my gaze to the floor as the wedding planner fixed my flowers, my dress, my posture. Thought about the stained glass blood as I willed away my tears.
Virgin sacrifice seemed a lot more straightforward than marrying a man I'd never love after sending away the one man I'd never stop loving.
chapter two
Audrey
Present day
Today's vocabulary word: cede
One thingthat was true about me was that I had a near-perfect track record of making the wrong decision when it mattered the most. I was not a cool head in a crisis…or even medium-stress situations. My critical thinking took a swan dive into shallow waters and my fight-or-flight instincts actively wanted evolution to come and pick me off.
When it came down to it, when my path diverged in the wood, I could be counted on to take the trail that would fuck up my life. Every time.
Chairing the planning committee for my high school's eighteen-year reunion wasn't close to the worst of my decisions but it was the worstright now. I'd lived through a lot of low moments in my thirty-five years but there was something uniquely painful in putting on a party for a bunch of people whodidn't remember my name and only wanted to know where my ex was tonight.
It pinched in all the wrong places to be reminded, half a lifetime later, that I was no one withouthim.Yet on the other side of that coin, I was here only because I knew he wouldn't be.
Jude would sooner fill his pockets with stones and walk into the sea than set foot on the campus of Aldyn Thorpe Academy again. This world of old brick and creeping ivy was mine to keep, along with the self-important scaffolding built around it. He wouldn't enter this Thunderdome of generational wealth tonight because he'd given up this place, this city, the same way I'd given him up. Land won in a war that'd killed me to fight.
Except— No.
Except yes, hewashere and watching me from the other side of the tent.
I had a thousand apologies, a thousand explanations that never would've mattered to him anyway—but in the span of time it took to register that he was here and staring at me after more than a decade of silence, those words abandoned me.
Just as quickly, the oppressive weight of the last words we'd shared, the ones that echoed in the dark of sleepless nights and the cold, lonely lows of being lost to everything, everyone, filled their place.
Why are you doing this?
I remembered gasping, the question landing with all the impact he'd intended. I thought about that gasp a lot. About how childish I must've looked to him. All dressed up—and for what?
He didn't know it but I threw myself on a grenade when I told him to leave that day. I still searched for some of the pieces of me lost in the blast, still felt my way around the tender, broken spots that never seemed to scab over. And he'd never understand why I did it.
