Page 85 of Wanted

My mother’s words are a painful reminder, they kick me in the gut.

I understand her doubts, I’ve even had them, but she hasn’t seen what I have.

She doesn’t know Stella the way I do.

I take a breath, I need to calm down before going to meet her. I’ve carefully drawn up a plan. I can’t wait to remove the horrible band that someone posing as me put on her finger and change it for the ring that has been in my desk drawer for a few days.

I want to make her my wife, this time for the right reasons.

I want to see her dressed in white walking toward me.

I just knew after the first time I saw her, with those blue eyes filled with joy after seeing mine open. What I saw reflected in those sky-colored orbs is something that can’t be hidden or faked. Stella was happy to see me wake up.

Clearly, it was expected, when she said she was my wife my reaction was visceral. I never lost my memory, even though my memories were hazy.

A woman like her is unforgettable.

I would have held onto my memories of her with everything I had in me. In the short time that I’ve known her, Stella has become my lifeline.

My whole life.

I can’t wait to share my future with her.

And that means we have to first clear the air between us.

She deserves to know the truth. She did it from the first moment, taking care of me with a gesture as simple as knowing that I would be thirsty.

And that indescribable feeling that I felt when our fingers touched for the first time.

Jackson didn’t have to insist too much that I keep her close to me. Instead of doing it because it was suggested to me, I decided to take the opportunity to woo the woman of my dreams.

I soon realized that it had been the right decision. Although Stella was hurt by the lies that she believed I had told her, she showed me her love in every moment.

Her conviction.

I could see the pride reflected in her eyes every time she spoke about her family or business.

Her reluctance in accepting my gifts, to manage on her own. Her stubbornness to start her business, her desire to study. Stella is smart, and I’m proud to know that she was reaching her full potential alongside me. For a woman like her there are no impossibilities.

Step by step, day by day, Stella gained my trust.

I’m sure there is a good explanation for the bank deposits. If she wanted money, it would have been easy to accept it with something as simple as an unlimited credit card. I had offered her the whole world. I was—am—willing to share my entire world with her.

She had turned my empty house into a home, filling each room with her light.

There is one thing I did agree on with Jackson Cole, is that she’s the key to this mess. So I had to protect her too, she was in the line of fire, as much as I was. To annul our marriage alleging fraud was out of the question, that would imply severe consequences for her, consequences that she didn’t deserve.

The hazy memories of the day of the attack come to my head like a movie playing at full speed. There was someone else, someone who looked very much like me and claimed that I stole his life before hitting me on the temple.

I look at the watch on my wrist one more time, shit, it’s getting late. My wife will be wondering why I’m still here, it’s a miracle that she didn’t come to get me herself.

I put on the jacket that hangs from the chair behind my desk, straighten my cufflinks, and go out to meet her.

In the refrigerator, I left a bottle of champagne chilling. I want to toast before leaving.

“Stella, baby,” I call out to her when I realize she hasn’t come down yet.

Women, she must still be fixing some of that shit, the makeup, the hair. What do I know about those things?

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