Chapter 10

He stumbled toward me and collapsed to his knees, his voice shredded raw.

“Ann, I’m sorry. I know I was wrong!”

“You can’t marry him. I’m the one you love!”

My gaze drifted to him, and it felt like looking at someone from another lifetime.

Otto Sanchez was nothing like the man I once knew.

Gaunt to the bone, his hair streaked white, as though even a light breeze could carry him

away.

I said nothing.

He grabbed the hem of my gown, hysterical,

“had no idea Marie was that kind of person! I failed your

“M took everything I had just to get to London to find you. Please, give me one more chance!”

No sympathy. No heartache. The only thing I felt was that he was ruining my wedding dress.

Nicholas kicked him away and shouted.

“How thick-skinned can you be? After what you did to her, you have no right to say any of

“Mit weren’t for you, she never would have been shot. She never would have lost the chance

to be a mother Someone like you deserves to rot.”

The words hit him like a wall. His eyes went hollow, and he spoke through tears.

“I didn’t know…..I’m sorry”

I refused to let this spectacle ruin my wedding any further. My voice came out cold.

“Otto, you and I ended a long time ago. Leave.”

Without warning, he pulled out a knife and drove it into his own chest. Blood soaked his

hands. The crowd screamed.

“Ann, if I do this, will you finally forgive me?

1 can’t live without you. I love you!”

I glanced at Nicholas, then spoke without warmth.

When the windweed, sad my bed was

“Oy, the this the mother too lov

yous И you’d may loved me, things never would have gotten this far from now se

whether you live or due has not to do with me”

I watched the tears roll down has faces and felt nothing like a single foole

Goodbye, Otto Sanchez for good

He looked at me one bad me, and then, sangay, he smiled,

“Ann, getting to see you in a wedding dress in this Meme is enough I’m sony”

Three years late

The Henson Group had reclaimed its position at the top, both domestically and overseas

Nicholas and I became the most formidable couple in the business world, and the most

envied

As for Otto

People would ask me: “Did you know he killed himself?

I stayed calm, composed Replied that I didn’t know

“He never tried to reach out to you after that?

He did

9,999 handwritten apology letters. Transfer agreements for every asset under his name.

I wanted none of it. I had no use for any of it anymore.

Today was our wedding anniversary. Nicholas had been acting mysterious since the crack of

dawn, covering my eyes and whisking me from place to place.

“Annie, open your eyes!”

I opened them. The entire sky blazed with the Northern Lights.

My heart slammed against my ribs, and I threw my arms around him.

“I love you!”

“So do I.”

The aurora stretched across the heavens, our witness. A love that would never change, never

be traded for another.

Someday you might think of me, and I’ll be frozen forever in your memory at eighteen. But we

can never go back.

Passing showers, chance meetings, oceans of regret and skies of longing. None of it was

enough.

Spring had come. It was time we all let go of the past.