Page 99 of Unwillingly His

I couldn’t stop.

Stella needed me to protect her, and I had failed her.

I got to where the tasting room had stood. Now it was a pile of rubble and wood.

“Stella!” I called her name as I dug, pulling pieces off the pile, trying to find her.

I tried to lift a massive beam that had so much pinned under it. It was solid oak, I had picked the piece of polished wood myself, but I couldn’t budge it. I used my knees, my back, everything I had, and I could only lift it a few centimeters.

Then Luc was next to me counting.

“One, two, lift,” he grunted, and we both managed to pull the beam off the pile, allowing us to get to the smaller pieces under it.

We worked together frantically and silently until Luc called, “Here!”

I ran over to where he was.

He was holding a feminine hand with beige polish.

It wasn’t her. I knew it wasn’t.

Ever since Stella dyed her hair, she refused to wear anything beige or white, insisting that a second chance at life meant she had earned the right to color.

Still, maybe she had been with Stella.

Her new assistant? Or a friend who was helping out?

We dug her out, but the poor woman was already gone.

Luc carefully brought her to the side and called out to the paramedics who had just arrived.

I kept searching for Stella.

A fist gripped my heart tighter with each passing moment, and I was starting to realize exactly how much Stella meant to me.

I told her that I admired her, and that was true.

I had told her that I wanted her, and that was definitely true, but there was more here, and I refused to let her die without telling her what she meant to me.

Fuck that. I just refused to let her die.

She wasn’t allowed to die before I did.

I forbade it.

No one knew the sting of losing a wife better than I did, and I refused to go through it again. Not now, not ever.

More rescue workers came to help dig people out, but they couldn’t find anyone.

“Could she have been somewhere else?” Luc asked.

“No, she was in the tasting room, trying the signature cocktails for the party. She has to be here.” I stopped to look around. The most charring was over by where the door should have been.

“Are you sure?”

“Positive. The manager sent me a text when she went in there to make sure I was here in time to take her to lunch afterward. I wanted to tell her how proud I was of her and—” The smoke and dust made my throat thick and my eyes water.

“Are you okay?” Luc asked, concern lacing his words.

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