After my entire family kept me in the dark and let my mother's adopted daughter marry my father's best friend. I didn't cry or make a scene. I just dragged my luggage and headed south alone. I changed my number and my address, cutting ties completely with that city and everyone in that circle. Down south, I built a new life with someone else and had a daughter. I thought I would never see those people again in this lifetime. Until I took my daughter to buy a birthday cake and bumped into Garrison and my brother at the entrance of the bakery. One had taken over Stratton Defense. The other had risen all the way to the rank of lieutenant colonel. We stared at each other for a long time, none of us speaking first. My brother was the first to speak, his voice sounding like it was full of sand. "Didn't you hate sweets?" I smiled and picked up the little girl beside me. "My daughter loves them." As soon as the words left my mouth, the cake box in Garrison's hands hit the ground. Fighting back tears, his voice trembled. "Vesper, didn't you say you would only ever have my children?" Back then, Garrison and I had agreed to go to the county clerk's office on our tenth anniversary to file our marriage license paperwork. But I waited outside the county clerk's office for an entire day. What I got instead was a live stream of his wedding. On the screen, Giselle was wearing my custom-made wedding dress, leaning against Garrison's chest, and blowing a kiss to the camera. "Seven years. We've finally waited until today." I felt like I had been thrown into ice water. My first reaction was to call Garrison. But before I could even dial, I saw my brother, Corbin, squeeze into the frame and say with a smile, "My sister marrying my dad's best friend really messes up the family titles—but here's hoping you two have a baby soon." Three minutes later, he called me. "You saw it, right? The one Garrison wants to marry is Giselle. Give it up." "They've been in love for seven years, and we've kept it from you for seven years. It's been exhausting for all of us. But he'd rather be this exhausted than let her go—he even chose the day you two agreed to file your marriage license paperwork to marry her." "You know who he truly loves now, don't you?" A metallic taste rose in my throat, and my tears burned so hot my chest ached. It turned out that for seven of the ten years we were together, he had loved another girl. Everyone knew, yet they all teamed up to keep me in the dark. *** I stared at the screen as if I were punishing myself. The family members who normally called me their baby girl were almost all in the banquet hall of his estate. "Garrison, you're so much older than Giselle. Don't you dare bully her. She has the entire Wentworth family standing behind her." The one speaking was my biological mother. Just a few days ago, she was smiling and asking if I had set a date yet. "Garrison, she's waited for you for seven years. Hurry up and get the paperwork done and have a kid. I've already bought your wedding present." The one speaking was Reed, his assistant of six years, and one of my few friends. He had almost been fired for misquoting a bid, and I was the one who spoke up and saved his job. "The biggest fear right now is that nuisance. If she finds out, she'll probably tear this wedding apart." The one saying this was a colleague who worked shifts with me at the Wentworth Medical Center. "What's there to be afraid of? I'll be the first to defend Garrison and Giselle's happiness. She wouldn't dare make a scene—her dad is still lying in that private rehab center, barely hanging on with money from the Stratton Foundation." The one who knew exactly what could be used to control me was my own brother. With one sentence, he nailed the coffin shut. The crowd cheered loudly, clinking their glasses once more. The laughter and jeering pierced through the screen and stabbed into my ears. I stared until my eyes physically hurt. I clenched my fists, my hands trembling uncontrollably. Those people weren't strangers. They were my family, my friends. Yet they were the ones who stabbed me the hardest. They all knew Garrison and I had been together for ten years. But they indulged him, even helped him, and kept it from me for seven years. To my face, they held me in the palm of their hands, calling me daughter, baby, their little princess. Behind my back, they treated me as a nuisance standing in the way of their happiness, a fool kept completely in the dark. With a crack, the screen shattered. I collapsed onto the ground along with the phone. Right at that moment, the phone rang again. Garrison's name flashed on the screen. "Vesper, I got in touch with a neuro-rehab specialist this morning. He said there's still hope for your dad's condition." "I spent too long talking to him about a consultation and forgot to call you. Don't be mad at me, okay?" My tears fell before I could find my voice. Even at this point, he was still lying to me. I bit the soft inside of my cheek, taking a long time before I managed to ask, "Garrison... is there anything you're lying to me about?" "Why would you ask that? Did you see something? Or did someone say something to you?" His voice tightened completely, firing off three questions in one breath. I swallowed the sob in my throat. Through my tears, I said, "No." He seemed to let out a breath of relief and switched to a negotiating tone. "Vesper, I know you care about your dad the most. How about... we wait until his condition stabilizes a bit more before we deal with our stuff?" After a second of silence, I hummed in agreement. "Okay, baby. I'm going to hang up now." He hung up the phone quickly and cleanly. Thinking back on it, there was an underlying tone of uncontrollable joy in his voice. The year I was recognized and brought back into the Wentworth family, my dad took an overseas security contracting job. His convoy was attacked on the road, and the explosion left him in a vegetative state. His biggest wish in life was to see me put on a wedding dress and get married. Even though the wedding wasn't happening anymore. If giving up that position meant my dad would wake up, I was willing to step aside. I curled up among the shattered glass, my palms covered in blood. Tears streamed down my face. On the phone screen, the photo of Garrison and me blurred into a mess before my eyes. I made up my mind, wiped my tears, and got into the SUV. The driver turned around and asked, "Where to, ma'am?" I tilted my chin up. "To his wedding reception."