Page 139 of When Hearts Surrender

“It’d be undetermined,” I whisper.

“Yes. Frankly, if this were Elias’s investigation and he was asking me if the deaths were from foul play, I wouldn’t rule that out at all. I’d frankly have him look into your family, to be honest, no offense.” He chuckles at his morbid attempt at lighthearted banter.

My mind blanks from shock. I grip the steering wheel tighter as his words echo in my brain. I can barely see straight.

Their deaths were from foul play. A person was behind all of this, not a curse.The truth hits me in the gut. All these years of terror, of living my life in shadows, in fear…all this time wasted. My blood boils inside me as my lungs clamor for more oxygen. I recognize this sensation—anger. My entire life spent on believing this ridiculous curse and someone was behind this all this time?

This has to be it. I need to tell Belle. She was right all along. I need to find her and tell her everything.

The thought of Belle sends a torrent of water inside my charred insides. Belle. The woman I wasn’t allowed to love because of the curse.

If a human is behind this, there’s hope for us. I’ll hire bodyguards for Belle, move us to another country, have a security team sweep through the house, perform background checks on everyone. I’ll exhaust my entire fortune to keep her safe.

We can be together.

The thoughts jumble together, my mind disoriented by this turn of events. But just when life has given me a ray of hope, a car skids into my line of sight and I swerve, but the rain-slick roads betray me. I know the moment I lose control of my vehicle, when fate decides to deal an unyielding blow. The moments slow to flickering flashes.

The weightlessness of the car.

The shrill screeching and spinning of the wheels.

The blur of blinding headlights.

The guardrail suddenly appearing in front of me.

Everything comes to a head as I’m wrenched back in my seat. I swerve, my heart lurching, breath freezing, and everything…everythingcomes into startling clarity.

They say your life flashes before your eyes when you think you’re going to die. But it isn’t my life filling my mind right now.

It’s visions of her. My Belle. Dancing with her in the cabin, listening to opera. Her lips trailing down my body, kissing the scars on my torsobut healing the ones carved deep inside. Her in the rose garden, painting as I curled my arms around her, talking about dreams of Venice. A letter of heartbreak clenched in her hand as I cradled her broken body in the rain.

My chest seizes, the visions and memories blinding, and I squeeze my eyes shut as I hear the screeching of metal tearing against metal, the passenger side of my car caving in as it scrapes against the solid barrier.

Airbags explode, the force ripping the air out of my lungs, and the world spins around me as I slam forward.

My ears ring and every inch of my body throbs, the pain a latecomer to the violence. Blackness dots my vision, my lungs trying to draw in oxygen, but everything hurts so fucking much. A metallic taste bursts in my mouth and a sticky wetness seeps into my eyes.

A thick plume of smoke fills the cabin, death beckoning me to join him in another waltz as the sounds of the outside world finally filter in.

Screaming, yelling, chaos. I glance out the broken windows, finding bystanders getting out of their cars, their shadows looming like the monster I’ve seen all my life, its talons threatening to finish what the accident didn’t.

As panic crashes through me with the force of a tsunami, I will my eyes to shut, to not look at the monster outside. I try to breathe, but the anxiety only rises, the waves smothering me from the inside.

I finally realize the truth Belle has been trying to tell me all along, but I was too blinded by fear.

If this were my last day on earth, I should’ve spent every single second with her in my arms. I should’ve fought my monsters, my anxiety, my fears, one by one, until my very last breath. I should’ve treated her as an equal partner and faced our challenges together.

I’m fighting for us, but I should’ve asked her to join the fight.

People pound on my car and nausea roils up my throat as everything becomes too much. Way too much.

With trembling hands, I reach for my phone and press abutton.

“R-Ryland…I need help.”

And much later, I realize…I’ve never seen Belle in the rose garden before.

Chapter 50

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