The Husband Who Regretted Too Late

Chapter 10

After that day, Austin and Amanda left her alone. They disappeared to attend some wedding or another.

Alone in the house, Selena felt her mind unraveling faster each day. When the butler knocked to call her for meals, she would stare at him like a stranger before fumbling through embarrassed apologies.

Soon, she might forget herself completely. She might forget Austin. She might forget how he had stammered, red-faced, pouring his heart out during his confession. She might forget his shattered gaze when she had wrecked them both.

The realization hit her like a tsunami. It dragged her under waves of terror and despair. She clutched her chest. Agony seared through her and stole her breath as if invisible hands were tearing her heart apart.

"No," she choked out, wild-eyed. She shook her head like someone possessed.

That afternoon, she rushed to a tattoo parlor. She had Austin's name carved into her skin as a desperate anchor. Even if her mind failed, this scar might resurrect him.

She saved Quentin's number as her emergency contact. Then she counted every penny. After her mother's care, the funeral costs, and that cursed ten-carat ring, the math drew a bitter laugh from her bloodless lips. One last card remained in her pocket.

That evening, as she scribbled in her diary, footsteps echoed behind her. She turned and froze.

A man loomed before her. Someone she knew but could not name in her fraying mind. She dug through the ruins of her memory. Her forehead creased with effort. She knew him, did she not?

Her fingers twitched toward the diary.

Austin gave her no time. He closed the distance in a heartbeat. His hands clamped onto her shoulders like a vise. His voice cracked under the weight of something fragile.

"The butler said you came looking for me at the movie theater during the fire that day." His voice was raw. Barely above a whisper. "Was it you who dragged me out of that suffocating darkness?"

His dark eyes burned with a storm of emotions. Doubt. Anguish. Torment. All cutting straight through Selena so deeply that her chest ached.

Reaching up, she gently smoothed the furrow between his brows. Then she shook her head firmly.

"What movie theater? I don't know anything about that. I never went." Her voice turned oddly eager. "Do you have cards? I need so many. Can you give them to me?"

The light in Austin's eyes dimmed like a receding tide. Yet his hands remained clamped around her shoulders. His next words were a guttural snarl laced with white-hot rage.

"Cards? Money? Is that all you care about? Was our past just nothing to you?" He shook her violently. His face twisted in rage. "Do you even have a heart left? Say something."

Selena gasped. Her face scrunched up in pain as she choked out, "Let go. It hurts."

When his grip slackened, Austin stepped back. He shook his head in disbelief. After one last lingering look, as if memorizing her face, he turned and strode away. His footsteps were heavy with finality.