Page 65 of Their Diamond Ring Ruse

He watched the door. And he watched, and he watched—until he snapped, flipping the glass table over and sending it crashing to the floor, shattering in a snowfall of razor-sharp ice.

She was gone.

And he was alone in his house. Just as he had always preferred.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN

LILY COUNTED THE number of steps to the door, then to her car. She kept counting. Anything...anything to keep her from falling apart. To stop her from focussing on the man she was leaving behind. The man who didn’t want her. Who had never said this was real.

Except she had felt it. She had felt his love with every touch the night before. But if he couldn’t take that step towards her, she wouldn’t force him. If he wanted to be left alone, then he would be.

It was that thought of never seeing him again that had the first tear falling.

Fracturing. Her heart, her soul...it was all fracturing. A fissure was opening up right through her, and into it fell all the memories they’d made. She couldn’t think of any of them.

Starting up her car, Lily took a deep breath and drove away from the house. Not to Crème, but to her brother. Why? She had no idea. He hadn’t been a supportive brother lately. But she had just lost her home—not the spectacular house perched on a cliff, but the man who lived in it—and maybe she craved something familiar. Something that might once have been comforting.

She drove along the street she had grown up on and turned into the drive of what was now her brother’s home. She took a moment, trying to breathe around the suffocating knot in her chest, but every breath hurt. As if she was choking on it.

Still, she tried not to let the tears fall. Because if she started, she likely wouldn’t stop.

Fishing the key she had not returned out of her bag, Lily reached for the lock—only to have the door swing open. And there, ready to start his day, stood Devan.

‘Lily?’ Surprise turned to concern, and then to anger.

‘Dev...’ she managed hoarsely, through the burning in her throat, and let out a muffled sob when he pulled her into a crushing hug.

‘What happened?’ he asked.

She swallowed, opening and closing her mouth several times, but no words came out. So much had happened. A lifetime fitted into such a short period. And all those memories she’d thought had fallen into that fissure now crashed upon her.

Devan led her to the kitchen, let her perch on one of the tall chairs around the large marble island where they used to spend their time. They hadn’t shared the same space in an age.

She watched her brother shed his jacket and take the seat next to her.

She toyed with the ring on her finger. Big and beautiful and sparkling. She pulled it off, turning it around and around between her fingers.

‘He called it off.’

She didn’t look at her brother. Didn’t want to see the smug satisfaction on his face. It had probably been a mistake, her coming here.

‘He couldn’t do it,’ she said in a small voice.

He couldn’t accept that he was good. Had pushed her away because of it.

‘I knew he would hurt you,’ Devan said lowly. ‘He never deserved you. Don’t worry, Lily, I can make him pay.’

‘No!’ she rushed out. He had been hurt enough. ‘Don’t ruin the deal for him, please.’

‘How can you ask me that?’

‘Because a lot has happened, Dev. Julian...’ Something caved within her just at saying his name. ‘He’s a good man. He just has his own battles to fight.’

Still she didn’t give up that ring. She was supposed to keep wearing it until the time was right to take it off. The time would never be right because all she wanted was to tie herself to him. She accepted him. All of him.

Over and over he’d said he was the villain, but he wasn’t. No matter what he did, she loved every part of him. Yet she couldn’t keep his ring on her finger because it hurt too much to see it there.

‘You love him...’ Devan said, sounding almost as if he still didn’t truly believe it.

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