Chapter 2

I repacked everything I'd just brought to the new house. In the morning, I'd hire a moving van and leave.

The gatehouse called on the house phone to ask whether they should report it to Ethan.

“You can tell him,” I said. “But I don't need his permission to take my things.”

Sophie got there before the movers did.

The moment she saw the luggage stacked in the corner, her eyes reddened.

“Claire, this is all my fault. I shouldn't have gotten sick last night.”

She lowered her head, looking wounded. “I'm sorry. Please don't take it out on Ethan. Don't move out of your new home over me, okay?”

I sighed. “You've misunderstood. I'm not leaving because of last night—”

Her eyes filled with tears before I could finish.

“Then is it because Ethan saved a room for me?”

I went still and followed her gaze.

She was looking at the room I'd wanted for watching movies. The electronic lock on its door was new. Sophie held a key card between her fingers.

Even the guards knew whose room it was. I was the only one still waiting.

“Please don't blame him,” she said. “I depend on him too much. I was the one who begged him to keep a room for me.”

She paused, then added, “And the roses. I know you like sunflowers. If I didn't love having fresh roses in my room, Ethan would never have planted them just for me.”

With tears in her eyes, she rushed into the yard and started pulling up the rosebushes with her bare hands.

I stayed where I was. I felt cold all over.

There could have been a movie room. He'd simply given it to someone else, leaving me to wait.

There could have been sunflowers. Someone else wanted roses, so I'd had to wait for those, too.

Somewhere along the way, Sophie had become the person Ethan couldn't bear to keep waiting.

I let out a bitter laugh and slowly followed her into the garden.

A thorn caught her finger. A single bead of blood appeared, and she cried out.

Before I could speak, Ethan came quickly through the side door and took her hand.

The two men behind him stopped beside the path. One tucked away a document he'd been about to hand him.

“Sophie! What are you doing touching those thorns?”

He couldn't look away from her finger.

She shivered. Her voice was faint and hurt. “Don't be angry, Ethan. I just didn't want Claire to be mad at you. I didn't want you to be upset. If you hadn't planted these because I like roses, there would be sunflowers here.”

“I only wanted to put things back the way they should have been.”

Ethan paused. Then he turned his cold, impatient stare on me.

“Seriously, Claire?”

“She likes a few fresh flowers. You can't even let her have that? You're going to be her sister-in-law, and you make her pull up rosebushes with her bare hands? You know they have thorns.”

He was certain I'd done it deliberately. The disgust on his face made that clear.

I met his eyes. I was so angry I laughed.

“I don't think fresh flowers are all Sophie wants. She's taken my movie room, and now she's moving into the house we're supposed to share.”

I paused, then added, “Maybe she'd like to be Mrs. Caldwell, too.”

Sophie's face changed. “Claire, how could you say that?”

“Claire Bennett!” Ethan snapped. “What the hell is wrong with you?”

He strode forward and seized my wrist hard enough to make the bones hurt.

“Last night you wanted to cancel the wedding. Now you're making accusations about me and Sophie. And you're still going to pretend this isn't some jealous tantrum?”

He looked down at me with the assurance of someone who thought he had me figured out.

As far as he was concerned, I was sulking. Nothing more.

He shoved me toward the flower bed.

One of the men beside the path shifted, as if he meant to reach for me. Ethan looked at him, and he straightened again.

“Put the roses back.”

He made each word distinct.

“Sophie offered to give up the roses for your sunflowers. She's already made a concession.”

“Stop making this difficult. Let the roses finish blooming this season. Next season, you can have your sunflowers.”

“Everybody gets what they want.”

I stumbled from the force of his push and fell into the uprooted bushes. Thorns dug into my arms. Pain shot through me.

Wait. Again.

I'd already waited four years past the date we'd promised to marry.

I was done.

Holding back the pain, I slowly stood.

“Roses or sunflowers. Plant whatever you like.”

“It's your house. Your garden. It has nothing to do with me anymore.”

I pulled a thorn out of my arm and turned to leave.

Ethan's angry voice stopped me.

“Enough, Claire!”

“Let me remind you of something. The medication the pharmacy sent for your mother is still in the car I arranged.”

He took out his phone and glanced at a message from the driver.

“If those roses don't go back in the ground, my men might not have time to deliver it today.”