Once The Rejected Bride, Now His Eternal Nightmare

point

faces-it all turns to ash in my mouth. This is my wedding day, and the

our lawfully wedded wife? Will you love her, comfort her, honor and keep her, in sickness and

sick. He is looking at me, and he gives me that smile. That same soft, shy smile he gave me the very first day we met. M

ath I didn't know I w

en he

N

n the perfect silence of the cathedral. For a second,

h the room. My own breath stops. It feels like a

e...?" My voice is a

e looks past me, his jaw tight.

utters. "M-Mr

nd clear, amplified by the microphone. It's a voice I don't recognize. "You ar

k. Embarrassment. They spin in my head.

ears ago, on a stormy New York evening. The rain is coming down in sheets, and I'm soake

ys. It's him. Cole Evans. He's smiling, not with pity, but with

offers me his handkerch

whisper,

e place. He looks at me, really looks at me, and s

my coat. That was the beginning. His promises pla

xactly my type,

ove of my lif

way about anyone. It's

nt scream echoes in my

from me. He walks straight to the front row, to where Mira sits in a dr

es his hand, and he leads her up the steps to stand where I am st

belonged to another. To Mira. She is strong. She is brilliant. She is everything

caving in. The pain is so immense I can't even make a sound. He never loved me. It wa

ily. My stepmother, Sophia, has a hand pressed to her lips, but her eyes a

His mouth is open. For a wild, desperate second, I thi

s eyes meet mine for a fleeting second, and then they drop to the fl

to my annihilation. They see the poor, rejected Marsh he

. Then her eyes slide to me. They hold mine, and in them is a message as clear

s windows melting into a dizzying swirl. The supportive arm of my bridesmaid feels a million

outs. "Ashley!" "

ud I feel more than hear. The world tilts on its side. My last conscious sight is not of Cole, or my

scandal. The headline writes itself in the darkening

, cold darkness swallows me w