The rain didn’t stop. It chased me down every street, drowning out the noise of the city and soaking through my thin clothes until my skin burned with cold. My suitcase dragged behind me, wheels catching in the cracks of the pavement, but I barely noticed.
Cosette’s words looped endlessly in my mind.
“Don’t you wonder who was really behind that accident? Because I know.”
I clenched my jaw and shook my head hard, as if I could fling her voice out into the storm.
“Why do you think I would believe anything you said?” I had spat at her before walking away.
Her laugh still echoed in my ears—sweet and mocking. “True, nice to hear you finally have some brain at least. It’s up to you to believe me or not.”
But she hadn’t stopped there.
“Don’t you know anything about the relationship between Selene and Carlisle? His father never agreed with her. Selene was too strong for a woman. His mother—oh, she was the worst—too conservative, too narrow. She wanted Carlisle to marry someone like me. Someone educated. Someone classy. Someone perfect.”
Her pause had been deliberate, cruel. "So, maybe you know where this is coming from? Or are you too much of an idiot to figure it out?"
I remembered how my lips had trembled, the words escaping me before I could stop them. “Did they… order that accident?”
Cosette’s delighted hiss cut through the storm. "Bingo! Though the one who came up with the idea was Mildred. But the order—it came from Carlisle’s parents."
Now, stumbling blindly through the rain-soaked streets, I pressed a trembling hand against my mouth. My stomach turned.
Carlisle’s parents.
The very family I had bent myself backward for, trying to please. The ones I had begged to accept me. I had tried so hard to smile, to serve, to be small enough, obedient enough, gentle enough—anything so they might approve.
And all this time… they had killed Selene.
My knees buckled. The wet ground met me harshly, gravel scraping against my palms. The rain pelted harder, as if the sky itself mocked my weakness.
I wanted to scream, but no sound came out.
I don’t remember how I reached the cemetery.
The storm guided me, or maybe it was Selene herself pulling me toward her grave. My hands found the cold stone, familiar under my fingertips. I traced her name carved into it. My throat burned.
“I tried, Selene,” I whispered. My voice cracked. “I tried to love them. I tried to love him. Even after they took you away from me.”
The tears came hot and fast, washing down with the rain. I pressed my forehead to the grave. “How pathetic is that? I gave my heart to the very family that murdered you.”
A sound escaped me then—something between a sob and a laugh. It started small, shaky, but it grew louder, twisting into something wild.
I laughed.
I laughed until my body shook, until the grief splintered into something sharper. My laugh was sad, then bitter, then mocking—until finally it curdled into something dark.
“What a cruel joke this is,” I choked out between gasps. “The man I devoted myself to… his family killed you, Selene. And he… that bastard fcking knew. He didn’t stop them. He didn’t protect you. He just stood there, too afraid, too weak—like me. Maybe that’s why he married me in the first place. Because I was weak enough to accept it.”
My fists struck the wet earth.
I cursed them all.
By name, one by one, letting each syllable drip with venom. Carlisle’s parents, who ordered Selene’s death. Mildred, who whispered the idea into their ears. Cosette, who delighted in tearing me apart. Emily, who spat at me as if I were less than dirt. And finally Carlisle himself, the coward who let it all happen.
The words tore out of me raw and jagged, carried away by the storm, but they left me hollowed and burning at the same time.
Then, as the fury ebbed, a thought flickered in the darkness. A name.
Sebastian.
Yes. Sebastian.
The one person left who had not abandoned me. The only one who might still stand on my side.
My hands fumbled desperately to my bag. My fingers searched blindly until I felt the smooth rectangle of my phone. I clutched it like a lifeline, my heart hammering.
“Sebastian…” I whispered into the rain, my lips trembling. “Help me.”
I pressed the phone to my ear, my breath shuddering, waiting for the line to connect.
And in the silence between the storm and the ring, I realized—this was only the beginning.
