Chapter 133 (1/2)

Her happiness is the most important thing, and not just to me; the world simply isn’t the same when Tessa Young isn’t happy. I would know, I spent an entire year draining the life from her while simultaneously making her shine. It’s fucked-up and makes no sense to the outside world, but I have never, and will never, give a shit about the outside world when it comes to that woman.

“Five minutes, guys,” Ken’s voice sounds from the other side of the door. This room is small and smells like old leather and mothballs, but this is Landon’s wedding day. I’ll wait until after the reception to complain about it.

Maybe I’ll just take my complaints straight to Ken. I suspect he’s the one paying for this shit anyway, given the state of the bride’s parents and all.

“You ready, you crazy bastard?” I ask Landon one last time.

“No, but I will be when I see her.”

Chapter seventy-eight

TESSA

Where’s Robert?” Karen looks around the small wedding party. “Tessa? Do you know where he ran off to?” she asks, panic in her voice.

Robert had taken on the task of entertaining the toddler while the women were getting their hair curled and faces painted on. Now that the wedding is starting, he’s taken his role back on, but he’s nowhere to be found, and Karen can’t hold Abby while helping with the first part of the wedding.

“Let me call him again.” I glance around the crowd, searching for him. Abby thrashes in Karen’s arms, and she looks panicked once again.

“Oh, wait! There he is . . .”

But I don’t hear the rest of Karen’s sentence. I’m completely distracted by the sound of Hardin’s voice. He’s walking out from the long hallway to my left, his mouth moving in that slow way it always has, as he talks to Landon.

His hair is longer than it looked in the pictures I’ve seen of him recently. I can’t help that I’ve been reading every single one of his interviews, every article about him, whether it’s true or false, and maybe, just maybe, I’ve emailed a few heated complaints to bloggers who have printed terrible things about him and his story. Our story.

The sight of the metal ring in his lip surprises me, even though I knew it had reappeared. I had forgotten how good it looks on him in person. I’m taken, absolutely consumed, by seeing him again, thrown back into a world where I fought hard in and lost nearly every battle that was thrown my way, only to leave without the one thing that I was fighting for: him.