When the Evening Wind Dies

Simone Laurent stared at the black card I had pushed back toward her. Her brow knotted tight.

"Spencer, playing hard to get was cute the first time. Keep doing it and it just looked pathetic."

She tossed the card onto the crate of scratch-offs, where it landed with a sharp clatter. "Fine, do not take it. Sounds like your father was tough enough to hold out a few more days."

My heart seized at the mention of Dad. She had no idea. The man tough enough to have sheltered me from everything was lying in a cold drawer at the funeral home, broken beyond recognition from the fall.

I did not say a word. I crouched down, picked up one of the scratch-off tickets, and dragged my fingernail across the silver coating. The dry, rasping sound filled the silence of our wedding night, sharp enough to cut.

Simone stood over me, watching. She seemed to wait for me to snap, confront her, or wrap myself around her legs and beg her not to leave the way I used to.

I did none of that. I kept scratching, mechanical and numb.

The first ticket won nothing. The second paid out two dollars.

Back when Simone had been the one chasing me, she loved dragging me to corner stores to scratch these things together. She had been the overlooked youngest daughter of the Laurent family back then, and I had been the golden heir of the Holts.

She would say, "Spencer, when I hit the jackpot, I am buying you the nicest watch they make."

Then I would tell her, "I do not need the jackpot. You are my jackpot."

Those promises weighed too much now. They crushed me.

My phone buzzed. It was a text from the funeral home. "Mr. Holt, the preparation of the remains requires a family member's signature. Please come at your earliest convenience."

My hand trembled, and my nail tore through the ticket.

Simone's phone rang at the same moment. In the emptiness of the bridal suite, the ringtone was unmistakable. It was a custom tone, one she had set for a single person.

She glanced at the screen, and the cold composure on her face softened into something tender that I had not seen in a long time. When she answered, her voice was gentle enough that it barely sounded like her.

"What's wrong? Does it still hurt?

"Do not worry, I will be right there."

She hung up, grabbed her clutch, and headed for the door without a glance in my direction.

"Simone."

My voice came out raw, barely holding together. She stopped and turned, her eyes full of impatience.

"Dylan got scared earlier. He had nightmares. I was going to check on him."

"Tonight was our wedding night."

I looked at her, steady and calm. Simone let out a cold laugh and smoothed back her hair.

"Spencer, you really wanted to do this right now? Yesterday, when you threw wine on Dylan, did you stop to think that he was my personal assistant? He only dressed like that because he was working the room for me, and you humiliated him in front of everyone.

"He was young. He was thin-skinned, and he was not like you, Spencer. You swallowed anything as long as there was money at the end of it."

Every word hit harder than the last. So that was how she saw it. I was the one being unreasonable, and Dylan Reeves, with all his calculated innocence, was the victim.

"What if I asked you not to go?"

I raised my head and looked at her through the mess scattered across the floor. The funeral home closed at midnight. If she left now and took the only car in the garage, there would be no way to get a ride from this villa halfway up the hillside.

I would not make it in time to sign the papers, and Dad would spend another day in that cold drawer.

Simone looked at me as though I had told a joke.

"Spencer, know your place. The Holt family was alive because I kept it on life support. What made you think you got to tell me where I could go?"

She turned and strode out without another word. The front door slammed shut behind her. A moment later, the roar of the sports car's engine rose and faded into the distance.

All she left behind was a room draped in wedding decorations and a crate of scratch-off tickets sitting on the floor like a punchline.

I looked down at the torn ticket in my hand. This one had won 100 dollars, but I had scratched through the redemption code and destroyed it.

The ticket was worthless now. So were seven years with Simone.

All of it had rotted through.