Chapter 10
ANGEL
Finally alone, now I could breathe.
It’d taken all my energy, from Nashville to Capri, to keep on my game face and hide the pain.
I almost fell to my knees as I locked the cedar door of my private suite.
Closing myself off from the world so I could now face the agony, the angst, the shame of being jilted at the fuckin’ altar.
The second primary bedroom in the residence was a cavern of ivory walls, carpeted luxury, and sleek cream-and-gold marble, but I scarcely noticed it.
I dropped my acoustic guitar case onto the bedding, and found the bar in the sizable living area.
I soon sank into an armchair facing the stunning view outside, a crystal tumbler of amber scotch in hand.
The liquid scorched my throat as I drank, brooding.
Losing Evangeline sucked.
I spent years planning a future with her as my ‘ride or die.’ Now, it was just over.
Hours, tears, memories, all down the drain.
With a growl, I reached for my guitar and plucked a series of minor, despondent chords.
Embroiled in heinous thoughts of Evangeline, I trapped myself in a loop of old ghosts, reconstructing our past.
The woman who ran into that Mustang was a lifetime removed from the innocent, pig-tailed blonde girl I fell in love with when I was 10.
I remembered the day I protected her on the playground, how she stared up at me with her massive, misted-over sapphire eyes as the teachers dragged me off her bully.
Her smile then made my chest seize.
I was the new kid from the northern beaches of Sydney.
My parents, sisters, and I had just moved to Nashville so that Mum could start her tenure as a professor of English at Vanderbilt.
I brought my Australian sense of humor to my new school, a healthy dose of defiance, plus a deep loathing for anyone who acted superior to the rest of us.
Evangeline, though three years my junior, became my obsession.
I adored her white-blonde curls, her laughter, and her beauty.
I had a hard crush on her and took every chance to protect her and, by extension, her sister, Roxy, becoming their guardian at school.
In seventh grade, I discovered her hiding in the back rows of the library behind the encyclopedias.
She was scribbling in a notebook, her tongue poking out.
She glanced up and saw me as I raised my chin to her.
‘What’s that you’ve got there, Evangeline?’ I asked, going for nonchalance as I slid onto the wooden bench beside her.
I peered over to read the cursive, flowery script on her page.
She’d written: I am Evangeline Forrest. Mrs. Angel Forrest.
My heart leaped with wild joy.
Her cheeks flushed, but she kept the notebook open, tracing a pink-tipped finger over the words.
‘I’m writing our future, Angel. Do you like it?’
‘Love it,’ I murmured, leaning down to press my mouth on her warm cheek.
Two years later, behind the burgundy barns on her father’s horse farm, she and I shared our first true kiss.
Her lips were soft, lush, and sweet, and from then on we became the ultimate high school sweetheart story, a fairy tale.
She showed up to every single one of my football games and local music gigs while I sat front and center for all her ballet recitals and cheerleading expos.
We spent our summers wrapped up in each other, living the peak Nashville teenage lifestyle.
We attended expensive lakeside barbecues, late-night movies, and endless dinners at country club patios where the sweet tea flowed like water.
Her father, Reese, wasn’t my biggest fan, to put it mildly.
The man had his sights set on her marrying into Nashville royalty, pushing his billionaire best friend’s son, Payton Deering, onto her at each formal function.
Evangeline was a rebel, though.
She was having none of Reese’s matchmaking, and she stuck to me like glue.
Not everything was rosy between us.
We had fiery, toxic breakups all instigated by her roller-coaster emotions.
She was wild, impulsive, and spoiled by Reese’s deep pockets.
Still, she was passionate and independent, and her magnetic energy had me hooked.
After high school, she enrolled in an elite Ivy League university and moved into a sorority house with manicured lawns and marble pillars.
At my dad’s urging, I signed my life over to the Australian Army, enduring boot camp and the blistering heat of foreign deployment.
Evangeline and I kept our bond alive through letters, static-filled phone calls, and hurried emails typed from dusty desert base computers.
Our early twenties introduced a much darker rhythm to our romance, transforming our love into a battlefield.
The crushing pressure of her father’s toxic expectations took a toll, and Evangeline began to fracture under the burden.
She disappeared for months at a time, ghosting everyone and severing all contact.
She abandoned her sorority house and her university lectures without a single syllable to her family.
Every time she vanished, I caught a flight if I could from wherever I was in the world.
I even burned through my military leave to hunt her down through Nashville’s underbelly.
I combed through dingy motels and dangerous crowds, pulling her out of the shadow of squalid rooms and sketch dens to haul her home.
Back to her luxury townhouse, one that Reese bought for her in the city.
I spent weeks with her through various brutal withdrawals from alcohol, coke, and one time, meth.
I held her shaking frame while she suffered through the cold sweats; I never left her side until she was clean.
Her demons persisted anyway.
If she didn’t get her way, she resorted to hitting, slapping, and kicking.
She loved punching my right shoulder whenever I said anything that ticked her off, most times when I was driving.
She figured I couldn’t just shift the car into park and walk away from her drama.
Even without her near me, I sometimes found myself leaning against the driver-side window out of habit.
Once, she took it to another level and pulled a pair of kitchen knives on me, in my own home.
I grabbed my phone to dial nine-one-one.
‘Call the cops, and I’ll make sure you spend the night in a cell,’ she hissed, eyes wild, high as a kite. ‘I’ll crack my head on the edge of the counter and tell them you beat me up.’
‘Honestly, jail sounds like a five-star hotel with guaranteed peace right now,’ I snarled at her, pressing call.
The police came, and thank fuck the female officer believed me, due to how high Eva was.
They took her away to calm down, and I ended up crashing at a hotel for two nights to clear my head.
Then she came crawling back, crying and begging for another chance, and like a sucker, I got back together with her.
Deep in my gut, I was well aware she was toxic as hell and that I was playing with fire.
When she hit thirty, she seemed to settle, burying the worst of her demons.
We got back together, and she established her roots in Nashville, blossoming into a couture stylist and online influencer.
I wasn’t a fan of her new career choice, but I never fought her on it.
I was just profoundly grateful she was my ride or die, my destined wife, the future mother of my kids.
Her brand took the city by storm, and she gained two million followers on Instagram and millions more on TikTok.
She hosted a fashion influencer podcast, Rose Without Thorns, where she shared fashion tips with her digital audience. She also founded an online clothing line, Rose it was diabolical.
Yet she still held a tight grip on my heart, and the realization made me want to punch straight through the concrete wall.
Drowning in my feelings, I lost track of time until Mrs. Campanelli knocked on the door three days into my self-induced sulk.
I ignored her at first, hoping she’d take the hint, but she was persistent.
On her fourth attempt, I pulled the oak door open, a sigh escaping me as I squinted at the light streaming in from the hallway.
The villa’s housekeeper stood in the corridor with a tray in her hands, her brow furrowed with concern.
‘Signore, please,’ the small-framed woman began, peeking past my shoulder into the dim room. ‘You’ve scarcely touched the trays I’ve left you. If you do not like the lamb, I can prepare something else. A fresh seafood risotto? Some local pasta? You must eat.’
I was running on pure fumes and about to blow, but I forced myself to dial back the edge in my voice.
She was just doing her job.
‘I’m not hungry, Mrs. Campanelli,’ I said, keeping my tone clipped to make sure she understood I was serious. ‘Grazie, but I just need some space.’
She remained still, unmoving, her eyes narrowed on me, and I sensed her maternal instincts kicking into overdrive.
‘At least let me change the bed sheets and refresh the room for you. It’ll only take a moment to make things comfortable.’