Chapter 4

In the end, the ambulance Yale promised never came.

Even as I slipped into unconsciousness, I'd clung to the hope that he might at least have the decency to call one, if only so I'd still be around to apologize to Willa.

He hadn't.

When I woke in the middle of the night, I was still lying on the floor, the blood around me long since dried. Somehow, I managed to drag myself up and call a cab to the hospital.

As the ER doctor tended to my wound, he sighed.

"You're a grown woman. It's about time you found yourself a boyfriend. Otherwise, when something happens in the middle of the night, you're stuck dealing with it all alone. You should've seen the guy who came in earlier tonight. His girlfriend had menstrual cramps, and he carried her all the way to the operating table in his arms. He even threatened our careers if anything happened to her!"

I forced a faint smile but said nothing.

What he didn't know was that I had a boyfriend. We'd even been on the verge of getting married.

My fiancé had simply abandoned me, bleeding and injured, in the middle of the night so he could play knight in shining armor for another woman.

After getting five stitches, I spent the rest of the night in the hospital lobby. By the time the first wave of patients began arriving in the morning, I finally dragged my aching body home.

The moment I opened the door, I was greeted by the heartwarming sight of a happy family of three.

Willa sat on the couch, sipping a mug of hot tea, while Yale sat close beside her, gently massaging her stomach with his large hand. His mother, Margaret Grant, had prepared a whole table of nourishing dishes and was fussing over Willa as she ladled out a generous serving.

The smile that had left deep creases around Margaret's eyes vanished the moment she saw me.

"Well, look who's got the nerve to show her face after hurting my precious goddaughter!"

She'd always adored Willa, treating her as more of a daughter-in-law than she'd ever treated me. The only reason Willa was her goddaughter instead was that I'd already taken the position of daughter-in-law.

When I didn't argue, she grew even bolder. With a sneer, she reached into her bag and began pulling out tools one by one.

A screwdriver, a wrench, a pair of pliers, a hammer, and a pipe wrench.

"If you don't like the jewelry Willa picked out for you, then you can take these tools with you and attend the wedding instead!"

I turned to Yale.

"Is this what you want, too?" I asked quietly.

His hand paused briefly against Willa's stomach, but he made no attempt to stop Margaret.

"You owe Willa an apology."

A bitter smile crossed my face.

I should have realized long ago that Margaret would never have treated me so cruelly without his tacit approval. Yale had never cared when I was hurt or humiliated, no matter how difficult his mother made things for me.

Naturally, she'd taken his indifference to mean that I didn't matter to him, and her treatment of me had only gotten worse.

This time, though, I was done putting up with it.

I pushed the tools back toward her.

"Save yourself the trouble, Mrs. Grant. I'm not getting married anymore."

Yale reacted as though I'd slapped him simply by my casual attitude. He completely ignored my announcement about the wedding, apparently dismissing it as another tantrum.

"Zoey Shaw, when did you become so disrespectful? You can't even show my mother enough respect?"

Yet when had his mother ever shown me any respect?

I'd made so many mistakes over the years, the biggest being my belief that if I endured enough, things would eventually get better.

Instead, Yale had just found my 200th flaw. According to him, I had no respect for my elders, and he expected me to bow my head and accept his judgment.

What chance was there that anything would ever change?

I should've learned my lesson the first time. Instead, I'd kept making the same mistake with Yale, two hundred times over.

Enough was enough. It was time to walk away.

Ignoring his dark expression, I slapped the key to our marital home onto the table and retrieved my suitcase from beside Margaret's feet.

"We're over, Yale."

His expression shifted slightly. His gaze moved from the key to my suitcase, then back to my face. Suddenly, he let out a contemptuous laugh, as though he'd caught me trying to pull some obvious trick.

"There's a limit to playing hard to get, Zoey. You're thirty. That kind of nonsense doesn't work anymore. Willa is better than you in every way. Who else besides me would put up with all your flaws?"

I paused on my way out, but only long enough to leave him with one final sentence.

"Then marry your perfect Willa and leave me alone."

Behind me, Yale's furious voice rang out.

"Let her go! Willa, you can move into the master bedroom. Don't waste your time worrying about people who don't matter!"

I tuned out the noise behind me, went straight downstairs, and took a cab to the airport.

My phone buzzed twice. Willa had messaged me, urging me to be patient and suggesting that Yale and I get our marriage certificate the following week instead.

Once again, one of them had made the decision without asking me.

This time, though, I wouldn't have to exhaust myself working overtime just to squeeze in another day off for them.

Instead, I could quietly board a plane and fly toward a new life on the other side of the world.

-

Third-person POV

Seven days later, Yale deliberately arrived at the registry office half an hour late.

He'd actually come to regret the harsh things he'd said to Zoey and had even made Willa move out of the master bedroom.

What angered him more, though, was that Zoey hadn't sent him a single message in all those days.

It was almost as if they'd really broken up.

He sat in his car, waiting impatiently.

After an hour, he figured she was still sulking. By the second hour, he was convinced she was deliberately trying to put him in his place.

Three hours passed, and he began to wonder if something had happened to her.

By the fourth hour, he couldn't stand it anymore. He finally messaged one of her close coworkers, Megan Parker, to ask where she was.

The reply came almost immediately.

[Zoey? She got promoted and left for a five-year overseas assignment. You're her boyfriend. How do you not know that?]