CHAPTER TWO: THIS IS HOW I DIED

It happened twenty-one days later.

The charity gala was packed with people who smelled like money and bad decisions. I was laughing with Marcus by the silent auction tables, my best friend since we were eight, the only person who had ever really had my back.

"Aurora, remember that internship you hooked me up with?" His grin was electric. "They offered me a partner track. Me. Partner."

I screamed and hugged him. "Oh my God,Marcus! I'm so proud of you!"

Then a voice slid between us, smooth and cold.

"Who's this?"

I turned and Adrian stood there holding two champagne glasses, but something was wrong with his face. His smile looked painted on.

"It's Marcus babe…you him right..?" I said quickly while taking one of the glasses.

Adrian's eyes cut into Marcus like glass. "Yes…the childhood friend."

Something shifted in the air but I forced a laugh. "Yes. He just made a partner track. Isn't that incredible?"

Adrian extended his hand. "Congratulations."

His fingers locked around Marcus's like a vice and the handshake lasted too long. Marcus's smile fell before Adrian finally let go, but Adrian's other hand was already around my waist, pulling me close, warm and heavy and possessive.

Marcus looked like he wanted to disappear. "Uh, thanks."

The room spun with laughter and music but all I could feel was Adrian's thumb tracing slow circles into my hip, a warning I didn't want to understand.

Marcus excused himself to find the bathroom and Adrian's smile dropped like someone flipped a switch.

"You two looked… comfortable."

I stared at him. "What are you talking about?"

"Nothing." He sipped his champagne while his eyes followed Marcus like a hunter tracking prey. "I mean you guys were looking too close, that's all."

I let out a laugh even though deep down I was nervous "He's my best friend."

"I know." His jaw worked like he was trying to keep something locked inside. "I'm sorry, babe, forget what I said."

But I couldn't forget.

That night lying in bed I felt the echo of his hand on my waist, his eyes on Marcus, the steel in his smile. That was the first crack, small enough to ignore but impossible to unsee.

Over the next few weeks the questions started, at first they sounded like love.

"Where would you go for lunch, babe?"

"Who was that on the phone?"

"Why were you twenty minutes late?"

But little by little the questions turned sharp, like accusations wearing masks.

At night I would wake to find him bathed in blue light with my phone in his hands, thumb scrolling like he was searching for something specific.

"Checking the time," he would say when I caught him.

"My battery died."

"Couldn't sleep."

But I knew what mindless scrolling looked like and this wasn't it. This was digging, hunting, waiting to find proof that didn't exist.

I kept telling myself it would pass because wedding planning was stressful and he had work issues he wouldn't talk about, but I was lying to myself the way people do when they're too scared to face the truth.

Thursday night, everything finally broke.

I spent hours making his favorite dinner, fettuccine with truffle oil, even stopped for white roses because I wanted to remind him of us.

But when I set it on the table he barely touched it, just pushed the pasta around like it offended him. His face was gray and his eyes were too bright, like he had been crying or drinking or both.

"Baby," I said softly. "You're not eating."

He looked up and for a second I didn't recognize him because the warmth was gone. His eyes were hard, haunted by something I couldn't see.

"They're trying to destroy me, Aurora." The words came out fractured. "All of them. They want to watch me burn."

"Who's trying to destroy you?"

"You wouldn't understand."

"I will babe, talk to me,you have been strangely lately.Maybe we could even see someone?A therapist or—"

His chair scraped back. "A therapist?You think I'm losing it? What are they telling you about me? What lies are you believing?"

"No one is telling me anything! I'm worried because I love you and I feel like I'm losing you."

He laughed then, this awful bitter sound that made me felt so scared. "Love. Right. That's what you call it."

"What does that mean?"

"Forget it." His gave out a cruel smile.

I stood so fast my chair screeched against the tile. "You know what? I'm going to bed. Come and meet me when you're ready to talk like the man I know."

I left him pacing with a glass in his hand, ice clinking, back and forth across the living room like a caged animal.

I laid on the bed and waited for him to put his arms around me and apologize for his behavior.But he never came.

The crash woke me as drawers were yanked open, something hit the floor, and heavy footsteps moved across the room.

The clock glowed red 2:49 AM.

"Adrian?" My voice came out rough with sleep.

He stood by the windows with city lights burning behind him.

"I know you're awake, Aurora."

"What are you doing?"

He turned slowly and in his hand dangled a locket.

I looked at it. It was marcus's locket, the tarnished heart-shaped one he'd given me when we were nine with a tiny photo of us inside, gap-toothed kids with our arms around each other. I'd forgotten it even existed.

"Explain this." The words came out sharp and cold.

"It's nothing," I whispered. "Kid stuff. I even forgot I had it."

"You forgot?" His eyes darkened and he stepped closer. "You forgot you kept another man's picture close to your heart?"

"Adrian, we were eight years old."

"DON'T LIE TO ME!"

The roar shook the walls and every muscle in my body locked up.

"Adrian, please. You're scaring me."

"Good." He dropped to barely a whisper, more terrifying than the shout. "Now you know how I feel,watching you and knowing who you really are."

"Who I really am? Adrian,you know I love you and only you"

"Only me? Really?" Something twisted in his face, jaw tight, eyes burning with something I didn't recognize. "Then why do you always spend time with him? Why do you always glow differently whenever you're around him? You love him, don't you? Answer me, Aurora!"

"I don't! Adrian, I swear!" The words tumbled out desperate and fast. "He's just a friend, a brother, that's all!"

"BROTHER?" The word cracked like a gunshot. "Brothers don't give sisters lockets! Brothers don't look at sisters the way he looks at you!"

I shook my head while tears spilled down my face. "You're wrong. You're drowning in jealousy and it's eating you alive. Please, listen to me."

"SHUT UP!"

While I was trying to explain myself and to get my Adrian back, his hand disappeared into the pocket of his silk robe, the one I'd bought him for his birthday, the one he wore every morning while we planned our wedding over coffee.

His hand came back with a gun.

Small, silver, shiny, it looked wrong in his soft hands and the world shrank to the black circle of that barrel aimed at me.

"Oh my God, a gun?" The words barely made it out. "Adrian, please, don't."

"You broke me." He could barely get the words out. "I gave you everything, my soul, my love, my heart, and you choose him over us."

"No! Please, don't!" I was yelling now with tears blinding me. "I chose you! I keep choosing you every single day! Remember the time you almost beat a man to death because he looked at me wrong? Remember when you canceled all your appointments just because I had a headache?"

I stepped closer with my hands shaking. "The promises, Adrian! You said we would grow old together! You said I was the one! We can't end like this, not like this! Please, please don't do this. I beg you."

His hand trembled and his eyes flickered and for one second, one heartbeat, I saw my Adrian again.

Then he was gone.

"You should have been faithful," he whispered. "You should have loved only me."

"Adrian, I do! Please."

"Goodbye, Aurora."

"A—"

Bang.

The bullet tore into me, white-hot, cracking through bone, stealing the air from my lungs. I collapsed with blood flooding my mouth, choking me.

Through the blur I saw him, my fiancé, the man who once swore he'd love me until death.

And he wasn't horrified.

He wasn't calling for help.

He was watching me die with satisfaction in his eyes.

"You did this to yourself," he said gently, almost kindly. "If you had been faithful, none of this would've happened."

Darkness closed in and my blood soaked the floor and my voice turned to nothing.

But one thought burned in me.

If I live through this, I will find him.

And I will make him pay.

Even if it's the last thing I ever do.