Page 82 of Forbidden Dark Vows

I don’t know what they’re talking about. I can barely even keep my eyes open, but the memory of the restaurant comes flooding back, and I think I know what they’re doing. They’re plotting to keep me and Harry apart.

“Ha!” Karl scoffs. “I can still remember the first time you said that. What a fucking idiot I was to believe you.”

“No, I meant every word.” Mom reaches for his hands, but he snatches them away. “I still do. You know how I feel, Karl, I just never thought… Well, I just never thought it would be so hard with Graham, you know, after the stroke.”

Karl rubs his chin with his hand, the scritch-scratch of his stubble rising above the gentle beeping of the monitor. “So, what, you think it’ll be easier this time around?”

“No!” Mom shakes her head. “No, but once I’ve persuaded Ruby to call off this wedding, she’ll be free to look after him. I’ll tell him then. No looking back.”

“What will you tell him?” The question slices the air and sends my pulse racing again.

“Everything. I’ll tell him everything.”

“Forgive me if I don’t believe it’s ever going to happen. You don’t have the fucking balls. I thought you did back then, but now…” Karl shakes his head. “Now, I’m not so sure.”

“I’ve already got the ball rolling, haven’t I?”

“Have you?”

Karl stares straight at me, his dark eyes like bullets, and I close mine quickly, pretending to be asleep. Please don’t let him think I’m awake, I repeat inside my head like a mantra.Please don’t let him think I’m awake. My heart is racing, and it’s hard to control my breathing, but something is telling me they mustn’t know that I can hear them.

I need time to process what I’ve overheard. None of it makes sense. Even seeing Karl and my mom in my hospital room makes no sense, and I realize with a heady sigh of relief that I must be hallucinating. The white corridors. The whispers. The maze. It’s all just a nightmare prompted by the meds they’re pumping into me through the IV in my hand.

I’ll laugh about this in the morning. I’ll tell Harry, and he’ll tease me about all the books I read. “See what happens when you live in fantasy worlds?” I can already hear him chuckling over it.

“What do you think this is then?” My mom snaps.

“I don’t know, Celia. You forget that while I’ve been on my own waiting for you, you’ve been playing happy family.”

“I couldn’t leave Ruby. She needed me. It wouldn’t have been fair.”

“What about me then? Did you care about me at all?”

My breathing is growing shallow again, and I open my eyes. Blink three times. Bring the room back into focus.

They’re still there, still standing in front of the window, still speaking in private hushed tones as if no one else exists in the world. I’m not imagining it. This is real, and the jolt of shock as I piece together what I’ve heard so far, pierces my chest and pins me to the bed.

“I can’t believe you’re even asking me this. What more can I do to prove it to you?”

“Leave him.” A bark more than a growl. “Leave him and be with me like we planned all those years ago. If you love me, you’ll do it.”

Love? They’re talking about love, but it’s all out of context. Karl Weiss and my mom. The word doesn’t even belong in the same sentence with their names, and no matter how I twist the conversation around in my fuzzy head, I can’t seem to make it fit.

“Are you giving me an ultimatum?” Mom’s voice is cold.

Karl shrugs. “Sure, why not? I’ll give you until Graham is discharged to tell him and then, if you still haven’t found the balls, you let me go.”

A sound like a sob escapes my mom’s mouth. “I’ll tell him.”

“No, promise me, Celia. You tell him or you let me go and then you’ll never hear from me again.”

“It doesn’t have to be like this, Karl.”

“It does.” Karl’s voice is gentle now. “It just does. I can’t spend the rest of my life waiting for you.”

He goes to walk away, but my mom grabs his hand, holding onto him for as long as possible. “I need you to promise me something too,” she says, and Karl nods. “Ruby must never know that I married the wrong man. She must never find out that you’re the man I love.”

“She won’t hear it from me.”

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