Chapter 6: What I Forgot to Hate

I did not run to Roman’s room.

I walked.

Every  step felt like wading through the lake again. Cold. Heavy.

The photo of seventeen-year-old me was in my pocket. It burned worse than the class ring on my thumb.

You were in a coma for two weeks. Singh’s voice played on loop.

I had no memory of it. No memory of a crash. No memory of my dad dying in my passenger seat.

I remembered a phone call. I remembered my mom screaming. I remembered the funeral where Roman stood ten feet away and said nothing.

None of it was real.

The ICU hall was quiet at 5 a.m. Too quiet.

Two officers stood outside Roman’s door. Singh had posted them when the radio said Julian was at the hospital.

“He’s stable,” one said. “Came out of surgery an hour ago. The doctor says there are no visitors.”

“I’m his wife,” I said.

The word tasted different now. Not like a lie. Like a wound I didn’t know I had.

The officer stepped aside.

Roman was awake. Pale against the white sheets, but his eyes found me the second I entered. No confusion. No seventeen-year-old softness. Just relief so sharp it cut.

“You’re alive,” he said. His voice was raw from the tube. “Julian didn’t—”

“He ran,” I said. “Singh shot him, but he was wearing a vest. He got away.”

Something closed off in Roman’s face. The strategic, dangerous part of him that used to run Kade Technologies. The part Julian should be afraid of.

“I’m sorry,” he said.

“For what?”

“For making you remember alone.”

I closed the door. The click sounded final.

“You knew. This whole time. You knew I was in that crash. You knew my dad died because of your family, and you let me think it was a heart attack.”

His jaw tightened. “Your mom made me swear. The doctors said the trauma would kill you if you remembered before you were ready.”

“So you decided for me.” My voice shook. I hated it. “You bullied me for three years to keep me away from your father. Then you married me to keep me away from him again. When do I get to choose, Roman?”

He tried to sit up. The monitors protested. Pain crossed his face, but he didn’t stop.

“You chose the lake. You jumped instead of giving him the ring. You chose me over your own life.”

“Don’t.” I held up a hand. “Don’t make this about some grand gesture. I didn’t jump for you. I jumped because I was angry. Because you let me believe I was unlovable for ten years when you knew why I forgot how to love myself.”

That hit. He flinched like I’d struck him.

Good.

“I hate you,” I said. The words were ice.

“I know,” he said.

“I hate that I don’t.”

His eyes closed. When he opened them, they were wet.

Roman Kade did not cry. Not in high school when his father broke his arm. Not when his mother died. But he was crying now, silent and wrecked, because I hated him and didn’t.

“Tell me,” I said. “Tell me everything. No more protection. No more lies. If Julian killed my dad, I deserve to know how.”

Roman swallowed.

“You were driving home from your dad’s job site. He was helping you practice for your license. My father had a shipment that night. Illegal weapons, going overseas. You overheard the route. You didn’t even know what it meant. But he saw your car.”

I gripped the bed rail. The room tilted.

“He ran you off the road,” Roman said. “Made it look like a drunk driver. Your dad died on impact. You went through the windshield. I was seventeen. I found out the next day because my father was laughing about it.”

Bile rose in my throat.

“Why didn’t you tell anyone?”

“Because I was a kid and he owned the police. Because he told me if I said a word, you’d be next. So I did what he said. I made you hate me so you’d stay away from my house. From him.” His voice broke. “Then you woke up and didn’t remember me. You looked right through me in the hall. And I realized I’d done my job too well.”

The photo burned in my pocket. I am sorry I was late.

He was late because he was burying his own guilt.

“So Vegas?” I asked.

“I turned eighteen. I got access to a trust. I used it to find you. You were living with your mom, working two jobs, still having seizures from the head injury. My father found out I was watching you. He said he’d finish what he started. I couldn’t stop him. But I could marry you. A spouse can’t be forced to testify. It gave you legal protection, and it tied you to my money if I died.”

He married me so his father couldn’t kill me without consequences. The ring on my thumb felt like a shackle and a shield at once.

“You should have told me,” I said.

“You would have gotten yourself killed trying to avenge him.”

“Instead I spent ten years thinking I was worthless because of you.”

“I know.” He reached for me. I stepped back. His hand fell to the sheet.

“I’m not asking you to forgive me. I’m asking you to let me help you remember, so you can decide if I’m worth hating.”

The door opened. Singh. Her face was grim.

“We have a problem,” she said. “Julian filed the injunction and added an addendum. He submitted a psychiatric eval from when you were seventeen. After the crash.”

The floor dropped out.

“He’s claiming you’re mentally unfit due to unresolved trauma and retrograde amnesia,” Singh said. “He’s using your medical history to void the marriage and take a medical proxy. And Isla, he listed your mom as a witness.”

My mom. Who let me believe a lie for ten years to protect me. Who would do it again.

“If the judge agrees, Julian gets Roman,” Singh said. “And you get a court ordered psych hold.”

Consequences. Because I remembered. Because Roman told me. Because we chose honesty for five minutes.

Roman was already moving. He ripped the IV out of his arm. Blood welled.

“Roman, stop,” I said.

“No.” He swung his legs over the bed. His face went white. “If she goes on that stand, if she tells that judge you’re broken, Julian wins. I won’t let him use your pain against you. Not again.”

“You just got out of surgery.”

“I got out of surgery for this.” He stood. His knees buckled. I caught him.

His weight was solid, real, and mine to hold. He looked at me, forehead to mine.

“Do you trust me?”

That was the question. Not do I love him. Not do I forgive him. Do I trust him?

I thought of the lake. The note. You were the only good thing I never got to keep.

“I trust that you’d die to keep me safe,” I said. “I don’t trust that you’ll live for me.”

Something fierce lit his eyes. “Then watch me.”

He kissed me. Not my knuckles. Not my forehead. My mouth.

It was brief. Painful. Salt from his blood and mine. It tasted like ten years of anger and one night of truth.

I kissed him back. Because I hated him. Because I didn’t. Because if Julian was going to take him, he’d have to take me too.

Singh cleared her throat. “As much as I love witnessing a felony escape, we have thirty minutes before that hearing starts.”

Roman didn’t let go of me. “Then we don’t escape.”

He looked at Singh. “You said the burner phone had my prints. And hers. What if it had one more?”

Singh frowned. “Whose?”

Roman’s mouth curled. It wasn’t a smile. It was a promise.

“My father’s.”

The room went still.

“My father is dead,” I said.

“Not your father,” Roman said. “Mine.”

The heart monitor beeped faster.

“Roman,” I said slowly. “Your father died five years ago. Heart attack.”

“No,” he said. “He disappeared five years ago. Because I found out he ran my car off the road. The same way he ran yours. I didn’t kill him, Isla. I buried him.”

He buried his father.

And if his father’s prints were on that burner phone, it meant Roman’s father sent the text. Marry me again. For real this time.

Which meant Roman’s father was alive.

Which meant Julian wasn’t the only Kade trying to kill us.