Chapter Eleven
I’M RUNNING DOWN THE driveway in the dark, gravel cutting into my feet because I kicked off my heels somewhere, and I don’t know where I’m going but I have to get away before I completely fall apart.
My lungs are burning.
My feet are screaming.
My heart is shattered into so many pieces I don’t think I’ll ever be able to put it back together.
I only pretended to want you so I could take your virginity.
The words chase me down the driveway, mocking me, destroying me all over again with every step.
I was so stupid.
So incredibly, pathetically stupid.
I thought he was different. I thought when he looked at me he saw something worth cherishing. I thought when he kissed me it meant something real.
But he was just like Joseph all along.
Worse than Joseph, actually, because at least Joseph never pretended to see me. He told me I was boring from the start. He never made me believe I was precious and then ripped it away.
Veil did.
Veil made me feel seen for the first time in my life and then proved it was all a lie.
What do I do, God?
I needed Him now more than ever, with tears streaming down my face so hard I can barely see where I’m going. The estate grounds stretch out endlessly in front of me, dark and unfamiliar, and somewhere ahead are the gates where Joseph is waiting and I can’t face him either, can’t face anyone, can’t—
A sound behind me.
Thunderous.
Getting louder.
Hoofbeats?
Sheer confusion has me spinning around, and that’s when my heart stutters.
Veil?
On...horseback?
Is this for real?
Riding hard toward me, his hair wild, his expression fierce and desperate and—
He’s not slowing down.
He’s going to run me over—
No.
He’s—
His arm sweeps around my waist and suddenly I’m airborne, lifted clean off the ground without him even slowing the horse, and then I’m on the saddle in front of him, his arm banded around me like iron, the horse still cantering beneath us.
“Let me go—” I struggle against his hold but it’s useless, his arm is locked around me and the horse is moving and if I fight too hard I’ll fall and—
“Never.” His voice is ragged, broken. “Evianne, never.”
“You said it was over—”
“I lied.”
The horse is slowing now, transitioning from a canter to a walk, but he doesn’t let me down. Doesn’t loosen his grip. Just keeps me trapped against his chest like he’s afraid I’ll disappear if he lets go.
“I’m so sorry—” he starts.
Same time I say, “I don’t believe you—”
We both stop.
Silence except for our ragged breathing and the horse’s hooves on gravel.
“Please,” he says, and his voice is so broken it hurts to hear. “Please, Evianne, just let me—”
“Let you what?” I twist in his arms, awkward on the horse, until I can see his face. “Let you explain how you only pretended to want me? How you were just using me this whole time?”
“That’s not—”
“You said it yourself.” The words rip out of me, and I can feel them scraping my throat raw. “You said you only wanted me so you could take my virginity, so which part of that was a lie, Veil? The part where you asked me to be your girlfriend? Or the part where you said you’d forgive—
“I lied,” he cuts me off in a voice that’s raw with agony. “Every cruel word. It’s all a lie.”
“And I’m s-supposed to just believe that? How can I trust you—”
“Because I didn’t know about Joseph.”
Everything stops.
The horse keeps walking, but inside me, everything just...stops.
“What does Joseph have to do with—”
“He’s here.” Veil’s voice is barely holding together. “He showed up at the gates tonight. During the gala. Told security he was your fiancé.”
“He’s—” I struggle to process what he’s saying. How can Joseph be here? And why is Veil thinking—oh, I just don’t get it, and all I can do is shake my head. “He’s n-not my fiancé.”
“I know that now.” His arm tightens around me. “But I didn’t know it then. All I knew was that a man showed up claiming you were his, and you’d never told me about him, and I thought—”
His voice breaks.
“I thought you’d been playing me. This whole time. I thought everything between us was a lie, and I was so angry, so destroyed by it, that I wanted to hurt you as badly as you’d hurt me.”
“So you said those things because of Joseph?” Something hot and sharp is building in my chest. “You destroyed me because you believed a stranger over me?”
“Yes.” He doesn’t flinch from it. Doesn’t try to soften it. “And I will never forgive myself for that.”
“You didn’t even ask me.” My voice is shaking now. “You didn’t even give me a chance to explain. You just let me kiss you, you let me think everything was fine, and then you—”
“I know.”
“You said prove it.” The realization hits me and it’s almost worse than the cruelty itself. “You let me pour everything into that kiss, and then you used it against me.”
“I know.” His voice cracks. “And it was the worst thing I’ve ever done.”
The horse walks on. The stars are sharp and cold overhead, and I’m pressed against his chest, and I can feel his heartbeat hammering against my back, and I don’t know what to feel anymore.
“Mother told me the truth,” he says roughly. “After you left. She told me everything.”
The words have me instinctively recoiling, but he doesn’t let go.
He knows.
All of it.
He knows how shameful—
“She told me what he used to say to you. About your virginity. How he mocked you for it. Called you a tease. Made you feel dirty for waiting.”
Oh God.
“And then she looked at my face,” he says, “and she knew. She knew what I’d done. Because I’d used the exact same weapon he used.”
The look on Veil’s face makes me swallow hard.
“I confirmed your worst fear, Evianne. That all men would eventually use it against you. That even me, even the man who spent weeks trying to show you that you were precious—”
“D-Don’t.” I press my hand over his mouth. “Don’t say that.”
He kisses my palm. Gentle. Reverent.
“You trusted me with something precious,” he grates out against my skin, “and I weaponized it. Just like he did.”
“You’re not him.” The words come out before I can stop them. “Joseph did it because he wanted to control me. You did it because you were—”
“Scared.”
I nod.
“Terrified,” he corrects, his voice raw. “Of being made a fool. Of losing something that mattered more than I knew how to handle.”
His jaw tightens against my shoulder.
“I built walls my whole life because I watched what trust did to the people around me. And when Joseph showed up at the gates calling himself your fiancé, every wall went back up at once. I was so certain, so convinced you’d played me, that I couldn’t see straight.”
“I’m not using you.” I cup his face now, making him look at me. “I never was.”
“I know that now.”
“Do you?” I search his eyes. “Because if there’s any part of you that still thinks—”
“There’s no doubt.” His forehead presses against mine. “You’re nothing like what I feared. You never were. You’re genuine and brave and real, and I almost lost you because I was too scared to see it.”
The horse shifts beneath us, patient.
“T-Tell me again.”
“Tell you what?”
“What you were going to ask me. On the balcony. Before I ran.”
His hands frame my face.
“Be my girlfriend.”
“T-That’s it?”
“Well, I was working up to more. But you ran away before I could get there.”
“What’s more?”
He cups my face, and my heart, oh my heart...
“Marry me, Evianne.”
I can’t breathe.
Can’t think.
Can’t process what he just said.
“I love you and I know I don’t deserve you after what I said, after how I hurt you, but I’m begging you anyway. Say yes. Please. Just say yes.”
I look into those blue eyes, and of course there’s only one answer to give, when it’s the man God chose for me who’s asking it.
“I love you,” I whisper with a wobbly smile, “and y-yes, I’ll marry you.”