Page 132 of Tangled in Vows

I scream, “Noooooooo!” just as two gunshots sound through the phone speakers. Both bullets hit Holden straight in the chest, his body spasming from the impact. I shake my head at the screen. “Come on, baby, move.” Silent tears run down my face, but Holden stays motionless on the floor with a dark puddle forming around his body.

The video abruptly ends and disappears entirely from the screen like it never existed.

“This can’t be real. Please. No.” A sob rips from my throat, but a splashing noise snaps my attention back to the present and Heather.

I squint at her and the empty water bottle she’s holding while my brain is still stuck on the awful video, replaying how Holden was shot over and over in my mind. “Heather, please tell me this isn’t real. Holden can’t be dead.”

My voice cracks with another sob, and I stare at Heather, watching her take off her glasses and her oversized black coat. Underneath, the dark clothes are plastered to her body. They almost seem wet, which makes no sense.

Her face transforms into something cold. Something ugly I don’t recognize. “My name isn’t Heather, it’s Lyndsay.”

I sniffle, although the tears have stopped. “What? What are you talking about? Your name is Lyndsay?”

“Lyndsay Kauffman.”

The words hang in the air, sharp and impossible, and my body stills. Why does the name sound familiar?

Something clicks in place, but no, that can’t be. “Veronica Kauffman’s sister?”

Veronica was one of the girls my age who lived a town over from my aunt’s. We didn’t mingle a lot with people from other towns, but sometimes, I’d spot them at the market. My thoughts are thick and heavy, a dull ache pressing at the back of my skull, trying to put the pieces together.

But absolutely nothing fits—nothing makes sense.

Lyndsay grabs her necklace and lets her chin fall to her chest, saying something I’m not sure I’m supposed to hear, but I do.

The air freezes in my lungs. “Holy shit.” My chest rises in quick pants, my entire body and brain tumbling into panic mode. “Did you just say?—”

“Shut up, you stupid bitch.” She points her finger at me. “You are a pathetic excuse for a human being, pretending to be this sweet, amazing girl. And everyone fell for it. But you never fooled me.” Her voice vibrates with anger and hatred, her face turning an unhealthy shade of red as she bares her teeth at me. “He loved me, and we were supposed to get married. But then you popped into our peaceful world—the shiny new toy that interested him just a bit too much.”

My mouth drops open at her words, and I bite my tongue.

What the actual fuck?

She sneers at me, her nostrils flaring. “The day you ran away was one of the best days of my life, and I thought we could finally be happy again. But no, he became even more obsessed with you and searched for you relentlessly. One day, he left for the city and never returned. A few weeks later, all that was left were hisashes. At least now, he can never leave me again.” She holds the necklace before her face and presses her lips against it. “Isn’t that right, baby? We’ll be together for all of eternity when I join you soon.”

Bile rises in my throat, and I’m not sure I can keep it down. Heather—Lyndsay—is talking to her necklace, to the pendant, like it’s a person. She can’t havehimin there, can she?

“Felix,” I whisper his name matter-of-factly, as if this entire situation isn’t completely twisted and fucked up.

Lyndsay weeps, her shoulders shaking. “He was my everything. I’ve loved him since we were kids and knew we were destined to be with each other. And we would have been if it wasn’t for you. You ruinedeverythingand stole my future. You took him from me.You. Took. What. Was. Mine.”

Before I can think things through, words fly out of my mouth. “You are crazy. I didn’t take him from you. I never even wanted him. We went out on a few dates because my aunt made me. I never agreed to the arranged marriage, nor would I have gone through with it. I told him I wasn’t going to marry him, but he wouldn’t take no for an answer. Instead, he raped me in front of his friends. He was amonster.”

Lyndsay rears back as if I’d slapped her, shaking her head almost violently. “You’re a liar. Nothing but a big, fat liar. He was the best man I’ve ever known, and you deserve every small thing I’ve done to you over the last few years. I should have made you suffer for longer. Ruined your public image even more. Taken away everything important to you and made sure the whole world knows what a filthy whore you are. But they’ll all know soon enough how putrid you and your dead husband are on the inside.”

I shake my head, as if that simple motion could erase the truth. “You’re behind everything?”

She lets out a bitter laugh. “Of course I am. Everything. All of it. It was pure torture to wait after I got hired, but I knew I’d give myself away too easily otherwise. After about a year, I started small to see what I could get away with. First the leaked underwear pics, then drunken ones too, to damage your good-girl image. The inappropriate fan gifts. It obviously wasn’t enough, so I pretended to be you and messaged with the guy until he agreed to meet you at your apartment with a knife. I wanted to screw with your head as much as possible. Make you suffer in every way I could think of. The flowers at the photo shoot. The threats. The song. Luke’s accident.”

“Oh my God. Luke.”

“It was all me.Ev-ery-thing. It certainly comes in handy when you have people who take just about any job online, as long as you pay well enough. Holden appearing like the knight in shining armor wasn’t my plan, but I couldn’t have set it up any better myself had I tried. In the end, it was perfect because he was the ultimate price. The ultimate payback. A life for a life, and so much better than taking yours. So much more painful and long-lasting this way.”

“No,” I whisper, the word fragile as it leaves my mouth. She truly is the reason for all of the mess in my life in the last few years.

A sharp sting of betrayal crawls up my throat, but I swallow it down. This woman doesn’t deserve my pain. Although I can’t decide if I want to pull the blanket over my head and pretend this isn’t my life, or if I want to throw myself at her and give her a taste of her own medicine.

Lyndsay blinks but doesn’t take her eyes off her silver pendant. “We loved to lie in the barn with the roof open to stare at the sky. During the day, we’d make out the shapes of the clouds, and at night, we’d try to find the constellations. We’d talkabout our dreams and our life together. I’d never been as happy as I was with him.”

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