Unclaimed Vows

Chapter 2: The Open Highway (Nyx)

NYX

The white lines on Interstate 55 blurred into a single, hypnotic streak under the glow of my headlights. Chicago was three hundred miles behind me, buried under a fog of rain and bad memories, but my pulse hadn't settled. My fingers were clamped so tightly around the leather steering wheel that my knuckles had gone completely white.

I eased my grip, flexing my aching fingers one by one, and glanced at the digital clock on the dash. 3:14 AM.

On the passenger seat, my phone lit up, vibrating violently against the console. Ethan.

He’d been calling every twenty minutes since I hit the state line, alternating between angry, booming voicemails demanding I stop being immature and frantic texts begging me to come back so we could "work this out like adults." I reached over, dragged the screen to silence, and flipped the phone face-down into the cup holder. There was nothing left to work out.

I pulled off at a desolate rest stop somewhere near the Missouri border to catch my breath and make the one call I couldn't avoid.

Because of how fast I had bolted from the penthouse, I hadn't even had the chance to step foot inside the clinic to clear out my desk or hand in a formal two-week notice. Leaving a medical practice abruptly wasn't just unprofessional, it was a nightmare for patient continuity. But going back into that building, where Ethan’s father sat on the board of directors, was out of the question.

I dialed the direct line for Dr. Reed, the clinic’s medical director and the closest thing I had to a mentor during my residency. It rang four times before going to his automated voicemail.

I took a slow, grounding breath, holding the phone close to my mouth.

"Dr. Reed, it's Nyx," I said, keeping my tone as even and clinical as I could manage. "I'm calling to inform you that due to a sudden and severe personal emergency, I have to relocate immediately and will be unable to return to the clinic. I deeply apologize for the lack of notice. All my patient charts from yesterday were updated and signed off before I left my shift. I've already submitted a formal request through the administrative portal for an immediate emergency transfer and license jurisdiction update to Texas."

I paused, swallowing the lump in my throat. "Thank you for everything you've taught me. I'll follow up with HR by email regarding my final paperwork."

I ended the call and let my head rest back against the leather seat. It was done. The official tie to my old life was severed.

My physician's license was still crisp and fresh, barely inked after months of grueling board exams, sleepless nights, and endless hospital rotations. Ethan had always treated my career like an expensive hobby, a nice little accessory to show off at country club dinners and say Look at my clever doctor fiancee. But that piece of paper was mine. He hadn't bought it for me, and he couldn't take it away.

I put the SUV back in drive and pulled onto the empty highway, the high-beam lights cutting through the thick darkness.

My mind drifted south, to a small, sleepy town that was a dot on the map called Oak Creek, Texas.

Six months ago, when the pressure of the upcoming wedding and Ethan’s suffocating family had started to feel like a noose around my neck, I had done something reckless. I had quietly bought a twenty-acre plot of land on the outskirts of Oak Creek using a modest inheritance from my maternal grandmother. Money that Ethan knew nothing about.

At the time, it had just been a foolish fantasy. A secret escape hatch I looked at late at night on real estate sites when I couldn't sleep. The listing had described a rundown, forgotten cottage, an overgrown patch of soil, and a collapsing poultry shed surrounded by wild brush and bluebonnets. It was nothing like the sleek, glass-and-steel penthouses of Chicago. It was raw, quiet, and completely isolated.

At first I just thought it would be a good investment. Maybe fix and expand the cottage into a country two-story villa and plant some fruits and vegetables and have some chicken and cow for milk, eggs and meat. It could be a good business or I could rent it out as a vacation getaway. Something I could call my own.

Now, it was my sanctuary.

As the sun began to peek over the horizon, painting the sky in pale shades of orange and purple, the heavy tension in my shoulders finally began to give way. I was tired down to my bones, my eyes burning from the road, and I remember that I hadn't had any dinner yet besides the sandwich I ate during break at the clinic, but for the first time in years, the air filling my lungs felt clean. I felt light and all the stress from work, family, relationship and wedding was gone.

No Ethan. No Chloe. No high-society expectations. Ans definitely no wedding.

Just me, my medical bag, and twenty acres of Texas dirt.

It didn't occur to me before that after studying so hard, dealing with backstabing chaotic family, dealing with Ethan, and the wedding, it all stressed me out. Maybe having caught Ethan cheating with my stepsister was kind of a blessing in disguise. It stopped me from doing the biggest mistake of my life, by marrying Ethan, and it gave me a chance to choose to go to a different place to live a different path instead of what I already expected.

I realized that I was not feeling really happy anymore with how my life routine went on before. Even being with Ethan didn't make me happy anymore. I don't even remember when was the last time we went on a romantic date with just the two of us and not because he had to go out at a dinner business meeting and I have to come along with him because his colleagues would also bring their wives and partners. It all became a planned routine that it became redundant and boring.

Now I was free of those things and I was looking forward to my new life in Texas.