Chapter 40

Zack’s POV

If you had told me three months ago that I'll be standing in a rose garden at sunset, rehearsing words I’d never say to Niina, I would’ve laughed in your faceyiu know,

But there I was, pacing like an idiot, clutching a velvet box like it was a grenade.

Niina,

She wasn’t like the women Ethan surrounded himself with, She didn’t need diamonds or limelight... She just had this way of showing up messy bun, ink-stained fingers, always smelling like tea leaves and making everything else in the room disappear.

I didn’t realize I was in trouble until I started missing her silence more than other people’s conversations.

And now? I was in deep.

Deeper than I’d ever planned to go.

“Still rehearsing, or planning to plant that ring?” Cleff’s voice cut through the twilight like a blade.

I stiffened.

Of course he would show up.

The man was a ghost with steel-toed boots, quiet until he wasn’t, dangerous without even trying. And lately, he’d been orbiting Niina like a damn moon.

I turned ar