Chapter 8
Four blacksuited guards moved toward Trent without a sound.
He was still trying to process my “betrayal” when they grabbed his arms.
His eyes went bloodshot. His voice cracked. “Sterling, this is my wedding! I spent three months planning it! You can’t just wedding and my woman!”
Meali
“Don’t forget about that tenbilliondollar project in Fairmont Bay. Your family chased it for three
years, and who got the final art
He paused, a nasty satisfaction
standards or what?”
o into his voice.
“And another thing, Sterling, you got no
“A woman who spent ten years with me? I got bored of her in bed a long time ago. And you’re up there acting like she’s some prize. You think the whole island won’t laugh at you for taking my
leftovers?”
He tried to keep going, but the guards were already dragging him out.
Declan looked down at me. “What he said…”
“I don’t care.” I cut him off.
The corner of his mouth curved, something soft and almost sad.
I squeezed his hand and turned back to the priest.
“Continue.”
Trent’s voice went from a scream to something broken.
“No. Sloane, don’t. Don’t finish this, I came back. I didn’t get the certificate with Aria, I didn’t. Do you hear me?!”
“This wedding… I promised it to you, I wanted it for you. And for me. This is the
life… the first time I ever wanted to marry someone.”
His voice splintered into pieces, and then he was gone.
The priest announced, “I now pronounce you legally married.”
Declan reached into the inside pocket of his suit and pulled out a ring.
Chapter 8
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One look and you could tell he’d had it ready for a long time.
He lifted my hand and slid it gently over my knuckle.
“There,” he said. “You ran away from me in college. Then I sent my dad to go charm your parents so we could lock this thing down and you took off again. This time? You’re not going
anywhere.”
I laughed.
My parents had given me ten years. Cut me off completely.
If I could come back after a decade with Trent, stand in front of them with my head high, they’d
accept him.
If I lost the bet, I’d come home and marry whoever they chose.
Declan was their “you lose” punishment.
All these years, I worked myself to the bone trying to prove my worth.
Traveled constantly for projects in both cities. Saw Trent less and less.
But Declan, my socalled enemy, I saw him at every pitch, every negotiation, every boardroom table. More than I ever saw my actual boyfriend.
Still, that professional face was always a blur. The clashes, the tests, the backandforth, it all blurred into one vague outline. A man always on the other side. A man who wasn’t easy to handle.
Until now.
I looked down at the ring on my finger. And fragments started coming back.
Back in college, I loved design. I filled sketchbook after sketchbook with jewelry drawings. But my father said business was the real path. Design was just a distraction.
One day he came to visit me at school and flipped through my book.
He got so angry he balled up a page and threw it in the trash right in front of me. “What’s the point of drawing this?”
That design…
It was the ring on my finger now.
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While everyone else told me to give up on my dream, someone had picked it up.
Held onto it for ten years.
Just waiting for this day to put it back on me.
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