Chapter 4

Jasper and Chloe came into my hospital room early the following morning. He hadn’t changed since I’d last seen him, and as he approached the bed, I smelled her perfume on his clothes.

They’d spent the night together.

“Wren, you haven’t forgotten, have you? Our appointment to get married is today.”

“What? Mom hasn’t even woken up.”

Chloe jumped in, though nobody had asked her anything.

“Don’t start an argument, girl. This is your wedding day. Getting the appointment was hard enough. You can’t just back out of something this big.”

I could barely hold myself together.

“How long are you two going to pretend? You know this appointment isn’t even in my name. You put Chloe down as the bride again, didn’t you, Jasper? How many times am I supposed to accept the same ‘mistake’?”

He frowned, pulled up the booking on his phone, and went still.

Chloe laughed.

“Oh, girl, your face. I changed it, Wren. It was a prank. A surprise. Don’t get so worked up. You can fix it when you get there.”

I could hardly believe what I was hearing.

Jasper wouldn’t let me touch his phone. I wasn’t even allowed to use it for something ordinary. Chloe, apparently, could pick it up and change our wedding booking without him noticing.

Those rules had never been about privacy. They’d been about who he preferred.

He exhaled and gave her shoulder a playful pinch.

“You’re terrible. How are we supposed to stay mad at you?”

Then he reached for my hand.

“Come on. We’re wasting time. I’m going to be your husband.”

“No,” I said. “We’re over.”

He stared at me.

“You’re breaking up with me? Because she changed a name on a form? That’s enough to end everything? What the hell is wrong with you, Wren?”

His voice rose.

“We already had the party. Our families are expecting us. You’re humiliating everybody.”

I gave a short, dismissive laugh. “Whatever you say.”

He grabbed my collar and hauled me out of the room. I clawed at his hand, but he only twisted the fabric tighter. In the corridor, a nurse started toward us. “She’s just nervous,” Jasper said over his shoulder, and kept walking. In the parking lot he shoved me into the passenger seat and locked the doors. Chloe slid into the back as if it were the most natural thing in the world.

At the county hall he never let go of me, one fist still knotted in my collar. I was still wearing my hospital wristband, the tape from the IV peeling at the back of my hand.

His friends and family had gathered for the civil wedding. There was a temporary photo platform outside the ceremony room, and a professional photographer waited beside it. When Jasper’s cousin saw the wristband and his grip on me, her smile died. Nobody stepped forward. Everyone just looked uneasy.

The check-in display above the clerk’s desks read:

[Chloe Reed and Jasper Bennett: Desk 2.]

“Wait, wasn’t he marrying someone else?”

“Is he trying to marry both of them?”

Jasper raised his voice over the whispers. “Please stop. The booking was a mistake, and that clinic visit was nothing. I wasn’t feeling well, and Wren was working. I’m marrying one person. Wren.”

He tightened his hold on my sleeve, looking nervous now.

I laughed, then faced the waiting guests.

“Morning, everyone. Just so there’s no confusion, Jasper and I have broken up. Whatever he does from here on has nothing to do with me.”

“How dare you?” he hissed. “You don’t get to treat me like this. Fine. I’ll marry your best friend. For real. This is your fault.”

He kept me beside him while he and Chloe confirmed their details at the desk. His fingers were locked around my wrist, and the clerk’s eyes dropped to the wristband and the bruise forming under his grip. She hesitated. Then Jasper snapped, “Just process it,” and she did. Behind us, someone raised a phone. No one else moved. He dragged me through the license, then into the ceremony room, where they said their vows before the officiant.

When it was done, he held up their signed paperwork and looked at me with red-rimmed eyes.

“Look what you’ve made happen. Happy?”

“Yes. I hope you’re happy together.”

I pulled my arm free and walked out.

Jasper caught me from behind by my hair. Chloe reached toward him as though she meant to intervene, but her hand stopped just short of his arm.

When he couldn’t hold me by himself, she stopped pretending and helped restrain me.

I struggled to get away. My foot slipped on the steps, and I fell, hitting my head against a brick.

Everything went black.

…

“I’m her family,” I heard Jasper say. “Her ID number is…”

He recited the numbers, then hesitated.

“Yes, that’s it. What? No, that can’t be right. Of course I remember.”

“Sir, the identification you’re giving us is for Chloe Reed,” someone told him. “We’re treating this patient for internal bleeding. She needs a transfusion. Do you know her blood type?”

“O. Wait. That’s Chloe. I don’t… I can’t remember.”

“Then answer this instead,” a second voice said, sharper now. “She has a head injury, and there are fresh bruises on her wrist and torn hair at her scalp. None of that comes from a fall on steps. What happened to her before she hit that brick?”

“She slipped. She was trying to run off, and I just—”

“Run off from what?”

Nobody answered. Then Chloe said, too quickly, “We were calming her down. She was hysterical.”

“Calming her down how?” The voice didn’t soften. “Mr. Bennett, I’m asking you. Who had hold of her?”

“I only grabbed her so she wouldn’t leave. Her hair, I… Chloe was helping. I didn’t think she’d fall. It wasn’t like that, I—”

“So you held her by the hair, a second person held her, and she went down the steps while you did.”

“Wait, you don’t understand. She—”

Another voice cut through the confusion. I knew that voice.

“She has the same rare blood type I do. I’ll donate if I’m a match.”