Allyson Mccray POV:
The pain was a white-hot sun exploding in my chest. I looked down in disbelief at the handle of the knife protruding from just below my collarbone. Then, slowly, my gaze lifted to the man who had put me there.
Jackson.
He wasn't looking at me. His back was still turned, his entire focus on Kaila, who was sobbing hysterically in his arms. He was murmuring soft reassurances to her, his hand stroking her hair.
My vision began to tunnel, the edges turning gray and fuzzy. The sounds of the hospital-the alarms, the shouting-faded into a dull roar. The world was being stripped away, layer by layer, until all that remained was that single, devastating image: the back of the man I loved, protecting someone else.
Then, just as the last of my consciousness was slipping away, the world snapped back into focus with a sickening lurch.
I was in a hospital bed again. The pain in my chest was a sharp, biting agony, but I was alive.
Jackson sat beside the bed, looking tired and annoyed.
"It was a reflex, Allyson," he said, his voice clipped and devoid of apology. He didn't even look at me, his gaze fixed on some point on the wall. "Things were happening fast. My body reacted to protect Kaila." He finally turned to me, his eyes cold and hard. "Consider it your apology for falsely accusing her about the parachute."
The words were so ludicrous, so utterly devoid of human empathy, that I couldn't even summon the energy to be angry. My heart, already a landscape of ruins, simply crumbled into dust.
Apology? He thought letting me be stabbed was a fitting apology for a crime I didn't commit?
I closed my eyes. It was all so clear now. In a moment of life and death, a person' s instincts reveal their truth. His instinct was to protect Kaila. His instinct was to sacrifice me.
He didn't love me. He probably never had. Not in the way I understood love. I was a beautiful object he had conquered, a prize to be displayed. And now, he had found a newer, shinier toy.
I thought of my first life, of how I had clung to the memory of his past affections, using them as a shield against the reality of his betrayal. I had allowed myself to believe his love was just… twisted. I had died for that foolish belief. I had let my parents die for it.
What a fool I had been. What a blind, pathetic fool.
Jackson Walters hadn't just broken my heart. He had lured me into his world with a grand performance of devotion, only to discard me with the casual cruelty of a child tiring of a toy.
He saw my silence and the dead emptiness in my eyes. A flicker of something-unease, perhaps-crossed his face. He was used to my tears, my anger, my pain. He wasn't used to this… nothingness. It was as if the person he knew how to manipulate had simply ceased to exist.
His phone rang, startling him. He glanced at the caller ID and his expression softened. Kaila.
"I have to go," he said, his voice already gentler as he answered the call. "You rest. The doctor says you'll be fine." He walked away, murmuring sweet nothings into the phone, convinced of his own magnanimity. He had saved my life with the best doctors, after all. He believed I was still his, bound to him by a love so deep it could withstand anything. He had no idea that love was already a corpse.
He was gone for days, tending to his traumatized new love. I was discharged, and he was there to meet me, not out of concern, but to issue a new command.
He handed me a thick file. "Kaila's birthday is next week. I want you to plan the party. Here are the details." He tapped the file. "Her favorite flowers, her favorite foods, the music she likes, the guest list. I want it to be perfect. Don't disappoint me."
My fingers trembled as I took the heavy file. The pages felt like they were made of lead. I remembered him doing this for me. I remembered him spending weeks learning my favorite obscure classical composer, flying in a chef from Paris because I'd once mentioned I liked his macarons, even learning to make a clumsy, burnt Black Forest cake himself because it was my childhood favorite. He had scalded his hand in the process, and I had cried while I bandaged it, my heart overflowing.
All that meticulous care, all that focused devotion, was now being directed at another woman. And I was being ordered to be the architect of their celebration.
The familiar sharp, pulling pain in my heart was there, but it was distant now, like an echo in an empty hall. It was a pain I had grown so accustomed to, it felt like a part of me.
I said nothing. I just took the file.
The party was a spectacle of obscene luxury. Jackson had transformed the grand ballroom into a fairytale wonderland for Kaila. He stood by her side the entire night, his eyes, once solely mine, now fixed on her with adoration.
The grand finale was his gift: a magnificent, diamond-encrusted tiara. He placed it on her head like a king crowning his queen.
"To the deepest love of my life," he declared to the hushed crowd.
The room erupted in applause. Kaila, her eyes shining with tears of manufactured joy, threw her arms around his neck and kissed him deeply.
Then, her gaze found mine across the room. Her eyes, glittering with triumph, held a clear challenge. "Allyson," she called out, her voice sweet as poison. "Where is my birthday gift from you?"
All eyes turned to me. The air crackled with anticipation.
I walked forward, a small, elegantly wrapped box in my hand. I had been planning this for days.
"Happy birthday, Kaila," I said, my voice even.
She took the box, a smug smile on her face, and opened it in front of everyone.
Her smile froze.
She shrieked and dropped the box as if it were on fire. The contents spilled across the marble floor: dozens of glossy photographs.
The room fell into a dead silence. Everyone craned their necks to see. The photos showed Kaila, in various states of undress, entwined with a series of different men. Rich old men, young muscular models, even one of Jackson' s business rivals.
The silence was broken by a collective gasp, followed by a torrent of shocked whispers and disdainful looks.
Kaila's face was ashen. "They're fake!" she screamed, pointing a trembling finger at me. "She Photoshopped them! She's trying to frame me because she's jealous!"
She turned to Jackson, her face a mask of desperation. "Jackson, you have to believe me!" she wailed, then made a show of running toward the balcony. "If you don't believe me, I'll jump! I'll prove my innocence with my death!"
