Chapter 2
Ethan looked up, and sheer shock flashed across his face.
His lips parted, as if wanting to ask how on earth I got in.
Before he could utter a sound, my best friend, Chloe, stepped in front of Daisy.
She pointed a finger right at my face and shrieked, "Hannah Vance! Have you lost your damn mind?"
"Crashing an engagement party to make a scene? Have you no shame, you pathetic home-wrecker?!"
When she went through a brutal breakup, she had begged me in tears to let her crash at my place.
Terrified she would hurt herself, I stayed by her side day and night, bought her meals, and cursed out her toxic ex with her.
And now, to suck up to Daisy, she was pointing at my nose and calling me a home-wrecker.
Tyler, the underprivileged student I had funded through college for five years, stepped forward too, frowning in disapproval.
"Hannah, just let the past stay in the past," he pleaded. "Don't ruin your own reputation over a petty grudge."
Staring at the tall, clean-cut young man, a heavy weight crushed my chest.
Years ago, he was scrawny as a twig, from a broken home, unable to scrape together even half his tuition.
I paid out of pocket to put him through his senior year of high school and all four years of college.
I stayed up late polishing his resume and called in personal favors just to land him an internship at a Fortune 500 firm.
Now, he wore an expression of self-righteous concern, urging me to forgive the very people who destroyed my family.
Smack!
A stinging slap landed hard across my cheek.
My father glared down at me with pure disgust.
"Why are you still so impossible? You just have to ruin Daisy's big day, don't you?!"
A burning pain flared across half my face, and my ears rang.
The physical sting was nothing compared to the agony tearing through my chest.
I was the one who was betrayed and discarded. Why was every single person standing on their side?
The year my parents divorced, I moved back to our hometown with my mother and transferred to a new high school.
Withdrawn and overly sensitive, I was the weird loner everyone avoided.
Only Ethan ever went out of his way to talk to me.
He chatted about gossip, the miserable weather, and endless piles of homework.
Raised by a single grandmother, he was remarkably perceptive.
He always noticed the exact second my mood plummeted and would do goofy things just to make me smile.
He told me he despised cheaters more than anything because an affair tore his own family apart.
He told me we weren't at fault, and that I shouldn't punish myself for other people's sins.
Once, after school, a group of neighborhood punks cornered me in an alley.
They taunted me about my mother being locked in a psych ward, calling me worthless trash.
Ethan threw himself into the fight without hesitation, shoving me behind his back.
Even when a brick cracked against his temple, soaking him in blood, he didn't take a single step backward.
The scar from that day was still etched into his hairline.
For countless nights, I would wake up gasping from the same recurring nightmare.
In the dream, my parents squeezed my throat with red eyes, screaming that they were taking me to hell with them.
I would wake up suffocating, terror and anguish flooding through my veins.
No matter how late it was, Ethan would hold me and whisper softly that everything was going to be okay.
Cradling my burning cheek, I slowly looked up at Ethan.
He had once been my entire sense of security in this world.
Could things ever be okay again?
How was I supposed to survive this?
Ethan's brow furrowed tightly, but his eyes darted away, refusing to meet mine.
"I know your childhood was rough and you have attachment issues," he said coldly.
"Just stop clinging to me."
"Daisy has always been the only one in my heart."
Three breezy sentences.
Just like that, I was painted as an unhinged, insecure psycho obsessed with chasing him.
He weaponized my deepest, most agonizing trauma to validate his picture-perfect romance with Daisy.
My father immediately stepped forward, announcing loudly to the entire room:
"As of today, Ethan, as Daisy's fiancé, will officially step up as the successor to Vance Enterprises."
"Starting tomorrow, he will take charge of our healthcare division."
The moment the words left his mouth, four security guards grabbed me.
Their grip was brutal, dragging me backward toward the exit.
My elbows and knees slammed hard against the sharp marble pillars, tearing skin and drawing blood.
Cruel whispers buzzed all around me like a swarm of wasps.
"Causing a scene at an engagement just to steal someone else's man? Desperate."
"She looked so quiet, too. Turns out she's totally unhinged. How humiliating."
I don't even remember how I limped through the freezing rain to get back to our apartment.
Ethan and I had spent six months picking out this place together as our future home.
Our photo from the hot air balloon trip was still hanging on the wall.
My architectural sketches were still piled neatly on the desk.
The fridge was still covered in sticky notes he had written to me by hand...
Every corner held proof that we had loved each other.
Now, every trace of that tenderness felt like a thousand needles stabbing straight into my heart.
All I wanted was to shove everything into a suitcase and run away as fast as I could.
Suddenly, the lock clicked, and the front door swung open.