The Billionaire Who Faked My Love Story And Lost The Real One Chapter 07
Garrick tore the city apart.
No border crossings.
No flights.
No hotels, no trains, no buses. Nothing.
He even had someone pull ER admissions lists, in case she’d been hurt.
Nothing.
Elara had vanished. Like she’d never existed.
They finally got the home security cameras back online.
He stood in the empty living room, staring at the last frame of footage.
At the front gate, a man in a black coat held a car door open for her.
She ducked inside, her profile lit clean by the streetlight.
The camera hadn’t caught the man’s face.
But Garrick knew that silhouette.
His hand shook. The cold started somewhere inside his bones and worked outward.
One thought. That was all that was left.
It was over. He’d found her.
Silas. The man who should have married her five years ago. He’d found her.
Garrick stood there, hollow, for a long time before he walked to her bedroom.
The room was trashed.
Wren had left the closet doors hanging open. The wedding gown was in ribbons across the floor.
The jewelry box was overturned, loose pearls scattered across the hardwood.
A picture frame lay facedown by the sofa.
The glass wasn’t broken, but one corner of the frame had chipped.
He crouched down, picked it up, and turned it over.
Elara. Five years ago.
She was swimming in an oversized hospital gown, leaning against his shoulder.
Thin face, sharp chin, eyes crinkled at the corners.
She was smiling, one hand bunched in the fabric of his shirt.
She’d just woken up. She didn’t remember anything…
He told her he was hers.
And she believed him.
She looked up at him with those wide, trusting eyes and said his name like it was the sweetest word
she knew.
In that moment, Garrick would have given up everything else and called it a fair trade.
He sat there on the floor, surrounded by shredded satin and scattered pearls, his thumb tracing the
face under the glass.
The glass warmed under his thumb.
But the girl smiling beneath it was on the other side of something he could never cross.
His phone buzzed over and over in his pocket.
He ignored every one.
Eventually the doorbell rang.
His friend burst in and nearly tripped over the shredded gown.
“Garrick! Wren cut her wrist. Deep. She’s at the hospital, losing it, screaming for you to come!”
Garrick pulled himself off the floor.
He looked at the photo one more time, then set it carefully on the nightstand, facing out.
“Let’s go.”
The hallway reeked of disinfectant.
Wren was in bed, her left wrist wrapped thick with gauze.
The second he walked through the door, she started crying.
She reached for him. Pink was already seeping through the bandage.
“Garrick…”
She was sobbing.
“You came. I thought you didn’t want me anymore.”
Garrick stood over her.
She tipped her face up. Tears everywhere, but she was smiling.
The kind of smile that said the worst was over.
She thought she’d won again.
He came. So he still cared.
As long as he showed up, she still had a chance.
Then Garrick spoke, his voice dead flat.
“Where are the rings?”
