The Billionaire Accidental Bride

chapter 8

Gavin POV

My memories were a shattered mirror, reflecting only fragmented slivers of a past I could barely recognize.

Yet, amid the blinding white noise of my broken mind, one single point of light burned with absolute, unquestionable clarity: Natalie.

I couldn't remember our first kiss. I couldn't remember the sound of her laugh from a year ago, or the quiet domestic rituals that must have built our life together. But my body remembered. My soul recognized her with a ferocious, instinctual gravity that defied medical logic. She was my north star, the only anchor tethering me to reality in a world where I didn't even fully know myself. I was consumed by her, helpless in my desperate obsession to keep her near me.

Right now, however, that anchor was slipping away.

Across the softly lit room, Natalie looked shattered. A cold, suffocating dread clawed its way up my throat as I watched her. Her usually warm, expressive eyes were wide, glazed with a dark, suffocating panic that I couldn't reach, no matter how desperately I reached out. Her bottom lip trembled, a subtle fracture in her composure that sent a wave of sheer terror straight through my chest. She was standing mere feet away from me, but the distance between us felt like a chasm growing wider by the second.

And it was all because of the parasite standing casually near the foyer.

Ava.

I cut my eyes toward her, a surge of visceral hatred cutting through the haze in my head. Why in God’s name was she here? I had barely been discharged two hours ago. My body throbbed with a bone-deep exhaustion, my skull pounding to the rhythm of my frantic heartbeat, and yet my ex-fiancée—the woman who had ripped my heart out and cheated on me months before the accident—had somehow materialized on my doorstep.

She stood there with a calculated, sickening smirk lingering on her lips, her eyes sharp and predatory. From the moment she stepped through the door, she had been dripping poison into the air. She had dropped vague, insidious hints, blurting out twisted half-truths about some night we had supposedly shared before my world reset—a night I had zero recollection of, a memory swallowed whole by the crash. Ava was deliberately feeding off Natalie’s pain, fanning the flames of doubt, weaponizing my missing memories to tear down the fragile haven I was trying to rebuild.

I wanted Ava gone. I wanted to drag her by the arm and fling her into the street. I wanted her on the absolute first flight back to whatever miserable corner of the world she had crawled out of, long before she could completely destroy the only woman who mattered to me.

Before I could even find the words to silence Ava’s toxic mouth, Natalie broke.

She turned sharply on her heel, her breath catching in a choked sob, and bolted up the grand staircase. The heavy, frantic thuds of her footsteps echoed off the high ceilings like a countdown to an impending catastrophe.

My heart slammed violence against my ribs. *No. No, no, no. Please, God, no.*

"Natalie!" I called out, my voice raspy and weak, straining against the raw ache in my throat.

Every second she was upstairs felt like a suffocating eternity. I tried to move toward the stairs, but my legs felt heavy, uncooperative, as if the physical trauma of my injuries was conspiring with the universe to keep me grounded.

Then came the sound of her footsteps returning—faster this time, rushed and desperate.

Natalie descended the stairs, and the sight of her sent a sickening wave of nausea crashing over me. She had a small overnight bag clutched in her white-knuckled grip, the dark leather swaying violently against her leg. Her phone was jammed awkwardly into the pocket of her jeans, and her jacket was pulled tight around her small frame as if shielding herself from a bitter storm. She wasn't just crying; she was fleeing. She moved toward the front entryway with a panicked, frantic speed, her entire posture screaming a desperate need to escape the room—to escape *me*.

"Babe?" My voice cracked, raw, fragile, and utterly suffocating under the weight of my rising panic. "Where are you going?"

Is she actually leaving me? The thought struck my mind like a physical blow, leaving me breathless and dizzy. The room spun around me. This wasn't supposed to happen. She had promised my mother at the hospital bedside—I had heard her voice, soft and steady, promising she would stay in this house. She was supposed to be here, by my side, helping me navigate the terrifying labyrinth of my broken mind until I recovered, until I was whole again.

"I thought..." The words caught in my chest, burning like hot embers. I took a tentative, agonizingly slow step toward her, extending a trembling hand that hovered uselessly in the space between us. "I thought you were staying. To take care of me?"

Natalie froze just inches from the front entrance. Her hand hovered over the heavy brass doorknob, her fingers trembling so violently that the metal keys clinked against one another. She wouldn't look at me. She refused to turn around, keeping her back to me like a protective wall, but I could see the agonizing heave of her shoulders as she fought for breath.

"Ava will take care of you," she whispered.

The words were barely louder than a breath, but they tore through the quiet room like a serrated blade. They were laced with an agonizing, unbearable finality—a quiet resignation that cut deeper than any scream or violent outburst ever could.

"I need to be somewhere else," she added, her voice fracturing on the last word.

Without giving me a chance to process the blow, she yanked the heavy oak door open. The cool night air rushed into the warm living room, carrying with it the dark, unforgiving chill of the outside world. She took a step across the threshold, her boots hitting the cold stone of the porch.

"Babe, please! Why are you leaving?!"

The burst of pure, unadulterated agony tore through my throat, ripping my heart wide open right there in the entryway. The physical pain of my healing injuries was completely eclipsed by the sheer terror of watching her walk away. I was broken—completely reduced to a helpless, weeping wreck in the middle of my own home.

"Is it because of her?" I pleaded, my chest heaving as tears finally spilled over my lashes, hot and bitter down my pale cheeks. I gestured frantically, helplessly, back toward the shadow of Ava, who stood watching the spectacle with cold, triumphant detachment.

"She’s leaving tomorrow!" I cried out, my voice cracking under the desperate weight of my begging. I took another unsteady step forward, grasping at the cold doorframe to keep myself upright. "It’s too late for her to fly out tonight, but I swear to you, she’ll be gone on the very first plane in the morning! I’ll kick her out myself! I don't care about her, Natalie! It’s you—it’s only ever been you!"

She paused on the steps, her profile illuminated by the pale moonlight, a single tear glistening on her cheek before she took a deep, shuddering breath.

"Please..." My voice dissolved into a desperate, hollow whisper that barely carried across the night air. "*Please don't go.*"