Chapter 3

Kacey Morton POV:

The rain eventually subsided to a gentle drizzle. I paid for my coffee and pushed open the heavy glass door, the cool, damp air a welcome shock to my senses. As I stepped onto the slick pavement, a familiar car pulled up to the curb just ahead.

A sleek, black Audi. Blake's car.

My heart seized in my chest. He got out, but he wasn't looking at me. He was opening the passenger door. Isabelle Humphrey emerged, a vision in a cream-colored trench coat, her auburn hair catching the dreary light.

Blake finally saw me. There was no surprise in his eyes, no guilt. Just a flat, cold annoyance. He thought I' d followed him.

I ignored them, focusing on unlocking the car-sharing app on my phone. The last thing I wanted was another scene. As I stepped off the curb to cross the small side street to my waiting car, my heel caught on an uneven paving stone.

A sharp, searing pain shot up my ankle. I cried out, stumbling, my phone clattering to the wet asphalt.

Blake didn' t move. He watched, his face impassive, as I struggled to regain my footing, my ankle throbbing in protest.

He turned away from me, said something to Isabelle, and then walked into the very café I had just left. He walked right past me, his expensive cologne a phantom presence in the damp air, as if I were nothing more than a stranger, an inconvenient obstacle on the sidewalk.

I leaned against a brick wall, biting my lip to keep from crying out as waves of pain pulsed from my ankle. It was swelling rapidly. I couldn't put any weight on it.

A minute later, Blake emerged from the café holding two steaming cups. He strode over to me, his expression unreadable.

"Let's go," he said, his voice clipped and impatient. He didn't ask if I was okay. He didn't offer to help. He commanded.

"I didn't ask you to wait," I said through gritted teeth, trying to push myself upright.

He ignored my protest. With a frustrated sigh, he set the cups on the roof of his car, bent down, and swept me into his arms before I could resist. His movements were efficient and impersonal, like he was loading cargo.

He deposited me into the passenger seat, slammed the door, and got in on the driver's side. He handed me one of the cups. It was black coffee. His preference, not mine. I pushed it back into the cup holder without a word.

The silence in the car was thick and suffocating. In the back seat, Isabelle cleared her throat.

"Oh, Blake, I'm feeling a little carsick," she said, her voice soft and delicate. "You know how I get."

Instantly, Blake' s entire demeanor changed. "Right, of course," he said, his voice softening with a concern that made my stomach churn. "I forgot. Just like that time we drove up to that cabin in Vermont, remember? You were green the entire way."

"You took care of me, though," she murmured, and I could hear the smile in her voice. "You always did."

They fell into an easy reminiscence, their shared past a warm, exclusive club from which I was pointedly shut out. I felt like an intruder in my own husband's car, a stranger listening in on a private conversation.

We passed the old botanical garden, its glass dome shimmering in the rain. My throat tightened. He had taken me there on our first date. He' d told me it was his favorite place in the city, a quiet sanctuary. He' d kissed me for the first time under the sprawling fig tree in the tropical room. I had treasured that memory, held it close as proof that he had, at some point, felt something real for me.

Now, listening to him and Isabelle talk about their college road trips and shared memories, a sickening realization dawned. He hadn't shared his sanctuary with me. He had taken me to a place that was already sacred to them. I was just a visitor in a memory that wasn't mine.

My mind flashed with a hundred other instances. The jazz club he loved, the vintage bookstore he frequented, the specific brand of wine he always ordered. Were any of those things ours? Or was I just living in the echo of a life he' d already lived with her?

I must have dozed off, the pain and emotional exhaustion finally overwhelming me. When I woke up, we were parked in the driveway of our house. The back seat was empty. Isabelle was gone.

Blake was looking at my swollen ankle. "Did you twist it on purpose?" he asked, his voice low and accusatory. "Was that some kind of play for attention, Kacey?"

The absurdity of his words, the sheer, unadulterated narcissism, made something inside me snap.

"Yes, Blake," I said, my voice dripping with a sarcasm I didn't know I possessed. "Of course. I intentionally injured myself on the off chance you' d deign to notice my existence. My entire world revolves around getting your attention, didn't you know?"

"Don't be ridiculous."

"I'm not the one being ridiculous," I shot back, turning to face him fully. "You want to know what's ridiculous? Believing for one second that I need you. I was a damn good architect before I met you, and I'll be a damn good one after you' re gone."

A dangerous glint entered his eyes. "Is that a challenge?"