Chapter 6
Elle POV
The bookstore's background music played on—something jazzy and instrumental that didn't match the strange intimacy of the moment.
And I became hyperaware of everything: the rain drumming against the windows, the rustle of other customers browsing nearby sections, the faint scent of antiseptic and that cedar-tinged cologne Adrian always wore, the warmth of his thumb as it pressed gently against my wrist to hold my hand steady.
He applied the bandage with the same careful attention, smoothing down the edges to ensure it would stay in place, then held my hand for just a moment longer, his fingertips resting against my pulse point in a way that made me wonder if he could feel how fast my heart was beating.
"Take care of yourself, Elle," he said as he stood, and the words carried more weight than they should have, as if he was saying something else entirely beneath the surface meaning.
I wanted to respond, wanted to thank him or explain or do something other than stand there like a statue, but my throat had closed up with an emotion I didn't want to examine too closely. Adrian seemed to understand, because he simply adjusted his coat and added, "If you need help with anything, you know how to reach me," before heading toward the checkout counter, leaving me alone with my racing thoughts and the ghost of his touch still warming my skin.
I looked down at the bandage—plain white, perfectly applied, already making the sting fade—and felt something shift in my chest. This was what being cared for felt like. Not the grand gestures Dominic occasionally made when he remembered I existed, not the expensive gifts that came with invisible price tags, but this: someone noticing you were hurt and taking the time to help, expecting nothing in return.
The realization made what I was about to do both easier and infinitely harder.
I made it halfway to Butler Library before my phone rang. Vivienne's name flashed across the screen, and I seriously considered letting it go to voicemail, but years of conditioning made me answer on the third ring.
"Elle, honey, I just got off the phone with the wedding planner." My mother's voice had that bright, brittle quality it got when she was trying to sound cheerful while actually being anxious. "She needs to confirm the floral arrangements for the engagement party by Friday. Have you and Dominic discussed the guest list yet?"
I stopped walking, standing in the middle of the path while students flowed around me like water around a stone. A few gave me annoyed looks, but I couldn't make myself move. "Mom, I haven't had a chance to talk to him about it."
"Elle." The brightness evaporated, replaced by the sharp edge of panic that lived just beneath my mother's surface these days. "This is important. The Callahans are doing us a huge favor by agreeing to this marriage. You need to show them you're taking it seriously."
The word "favor" stuck in my throat like a fishbone. I thought about the contract Dominic had shown me in the car, about my mother's signature on the guarantor line, about the way everyone kept framing my entire future as something I should be grateful for rather than something I'd chosen.
"What if I'm not sure I want to marry him?"
The silence that followed was so complete I thought the call had dropped. Then Vivienne's voice came back, higher and tighter than before. "What are you talking about? Elle, do you have any idea how much debt I'm carrying? Do you know what the Callahans have done for us? If you back out now, we'll lose everything."
Not "you'll lose your chance at a good life" or "you'll break Dominic's heart." Just "we'll lose everything," as if my primary function was to serve as collateral against my mother's mounting medical bills. I closed my eyes and saw, with painful clarity, exactly how this conversation would go if I told her what I'd witnessed last night.
She wouldn't care that Dominic had been with another woman. She'd find a way to blame me for not keeping him interested, for being too prudish or too boring or too whatever excuse would let her maintain the fantasy that this marriage was going to save us.
"I've already told everyone about the engagement," Vivienne continued, her voice climbing toward hysteria. "My friends, your aunt, everyone at the hospital. If you embarrass me now, Elle, I will never forgive you."
There it was. Not "I'm worried about you" or "let's talk about what's wrong." Just the threat of withdrawal, the promise that my mother's love—such as it was—came with conditions I'd apparently failed to meet.
"I have to go, Mom." My voice sounded strange to my own ears, flat and distant. "I'll call you later."
I hung up before she could respond and stood there with the phone pressed against my chest, feeling the weight of expectations I'd never asked to carry pressing down on my shoulders like a physical thing. Around me, campus life continued its normal rhythm: students rushing to class, professors discussing research over takeout coffee, someone practicing violin in one of the music building's upper windows. The world kept turning, indifferent to the fact that mine was falling apart.
My phone buzzed with incoming texts—Vivienne, probably, trying to walk back the harshness of her words now that she'd had a moment to think—but I couldn't look at them. Instead, I stared at the photo that served as my lock screen: a picture from my high school graduation, my mother and me standing in front of the Columbia gates, both of us smiling. I'd been so happy that day, convinced that getting into a good school meant I'd finally have control over my own life.
How naive I'd been. How thoroughly I'd misunderstood that every opportunity came with strings attached, and that my mother had been quietly weaving a net around me for years, each thread labeled with words like "duty" and "family" and "gratitude."
I shoved the phone in my pocket and forced myself to start walking again. Butler Library loomed ahead, all Gothic grandeur and the weight of a hundred years of academic tradition. Somewhere inside, Dominic was waiting—not to explain his infidelity, because he didn't even know I'd witnessed it, but to lecture me about respect and proper behavior, to chastise me for leaving the gala without telling him, as if I were a child who'd embarrassed him in front of his parents' friends.
He had no idea what was coming. He thought this would be another conversation where he laid down the rules and I nodded along, apologized for whatever transgression he'd decided I'd committed, promised to do better next time. He was probably already planning how magnanimous he'd be in forgiving me, how understanding he'd seem while making it clear that such behavior wouldn't be tolerated again.
But as I climbed the library steps, my hand throbbed beneath Adrian's carefully applied bandage, and I felt something crystallize in my chest—not courage exactly, but a bone-deep exhaustion with performing the role everyone expected me to play. Dominic wanted to talk about respect? Fine. We could talk about what respect actually meant, about trust and fidelity and all the things he'd shattered while I'd been busy trying to be the perfect fiancée.
Maybe not this time. Maybe, for once in my life, I was going to be the one doing the walking away.
