Chapter 191
But when I thought about the look on her face when she talked about her trauma-the mist in her eyes that she thought I didn’t notice, the way her fingers trembled, the subtle heave of her chest when she forced out the words, like it was painful for her to think about-I knew she was telling the truth.
“It was an accident,” I said. “She told me so.”
Marcus lifted a brow. “Are you sure about that?”
“Mostly.”
“When it comes to something like this, ‘mostly’ isn’t really good enough.’
I dragged my lower lip through my teeth and sighed. “I know Ellie, Marcus. More than she thinks I do. Something happened to her, and she won’t tell me what it was, but that was the only reason why she acted out today. She didn’t mean to hurt me.”
My Beta didn’t look particularly convinced, but to his credit, he didn’t press the issue.
“So,” he said, “what’s your next move?”
I considered for a moment, then replied, “Give the guests another round of drinks and food. Tell them it was a stunt, and that Ellie and I went on our honeymoon early. I know it won’t be sufficient for most of them, but it’ll be enough to keep the worst of the gossip at bay for now.”
The Beta nodded. “And as for the Luna?”
Luna. The word shot through me. That was what she was now, although it didn’t really feel like it. We’d exchanged vows, and for a little while I thought things were good, but now…
What were we to each other?
“I’ll handle it,” I said.
Marcus dipped his head and left after that. I stood there for a moment longer in the quiet, resolving to find a way to get Ellie to tell me more about the trauma she’d endured.
Maybe, if she opened up about it, we could unpack it together. And maybe then she wouldn’t hate me so much anymore. We could go back to the way things had been. Or rather, the way things could have been.
I wanted to go to her room that night, but I knew it was best to give her her space. So I had no choice but to retreat to my own.
The room had been prepared with rose petals and a tray of champagne for our wedding night. Since it was just me now, it was far too much alcohol for one, but I indulged anyway, because for a little while, it smoothed out the edges of the day.
I drank one glass, then another. Soon, without fully realizing it, I had finished the whole bottle. My head felt fuzzy and everything was warm, but I still felt lonely and confused and pissed off, so I grabbed a bottle of bourbon from the kitchen and drank that, too.
By the time exhaustion took hold of me, the room was spinning around me and I felt sick to my stomach like I was on a boat on a stormy sea. I flopped onto the bed, rose petals fluttering all around me, still in my trousers and shoes, shirtless with only the bandages covering my midsection.
Sleep came fast and hard, but it was anything but restful. I had sickening dreams of Ellie twirling in a white dress that slowly turned red with blood from a wound that blossomed outward from her belly. The red flew outwards, scattering into petals that dripped crimson onto my cheeks. She twirled and twirled and she didn’t look at me, and then I was sinking, and something was piercing my chest over and over.
I looked down, and a knife was embedded in my heart. The blood was turning the dance floor into a roiling ocean, the petals like fat raindrops on the surface, filling the room. I tried to call her name, but she just kept twirling, her dress creating a whirlpool in the water. She turned into a cyclone. She was massive and looming and expressionless, and she never stopped twirling, and she
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never looked at me.
Then, I sank beneath the surface, and my chest burst against the red tide.
+30 Bonus
