chapter 11 - " The storm "
1211 Words
Ashlyn’s POV
The rain had started long before the thunder.
But I only felt it when I reached the terrace.
Drops sliding down my skin like his secrets had—slow, cold, and heavy.
I needed to breathe.
To scream.
To tear the sky open with the ache blooming inside me.
The diary was still clutched to my chest, soaked through. But it didn’t matter.
Nothing mattered—except the truth I now knew.
Ryder.
Not Asher.
The man who held me on the bus…
The man whose voice pulled my name from places I didn’t know existed…
He wasn’t just a stranger with my husband’s face.
He was the one I had always felt but never fully seen.
I tilted my head back, letting the rain wash down my cheeks like it could erase the time we lost.
Then—
The sound of boots behind me.
Solid. Controlled.
Him.
𝐑𝐲𝐝𝐞𝐫
Unmasked. Unapologetic.
Looking at me like I was salvation and sin all at once.
His eyes met mine, but I didn’t move.
I couldn’t.
Because if I took one step toward him, I would shatter.
He stopped just inches away, water dripping from his lashes. His chest rising and falling like he was holding back a scream.
“You lied,” I whispered, barely breathing.
He didn’t speak.
“I let myself love you. Again. Even when I didn’t know who you were.”
My voice cracked.
“I was falling in love with a stranger—only he wasn’t a stranger, was he? He was the ghost of a man I didn’t even know I missed!”
I slapped my palm to his chest. He didn’t flinch.
“I gave you my heart—and you wrapped it in silence.”
Tears burst from my eyes like the sky cracked open above us. I pounded at his chest, my fists weak, my soul screaming.
“I hate you for this,” I sobbed.
He caught my wrists. Gently.
Didn’t stop me.
Didn’t move away.
Just let me fall apart in the storm that he became.
“I hate that I waited for a man who never existed,” I cried, choking on the sobs now. “And I hate that it was you all along.”
He pulled me in.
I didn’t want to go.
But I did.
Because even my fury knew… it belonged in his arms.
His hands slid around me, grounding me.
“Let it out,” he whispered. “I’ll take it all.”
So I did.
I screamed. I hit. I cried like a girl who had her soul torn into pieces.
But he just held me tighter. Like he was scared I’d disappear between the thunderclaps.
“You should’ve told me,” I whispered into his chest. “You should’ve trusted me.”
“I was scared,” he breathed. “Not of the truth. But of losing you to it.”
My knees buckled.
But he caught me before I hit the ground.
And when my sobs turned into silent trembling, when the pain began to fold into raw exhaustion—he tipped my chin up with two fingers.
Our eyes locked.
And then—
He kissed me.
Deep.
Demanding.
The kind of kiss that shattered every wall I'd just built.
His tongue claimed mine, slow and unforgiving, and I whimpered against his mouth—because even now, this felt like home.
My fingers curled into his soaked shirt, pulling him closer.
He lifted me—arms sliding under my thighs—and I wrapped around him like I’d never let go.
He pressed me to the wall behind us, his mouth never leaving mine.
The rain didn’t stop.
Neither did we.
“Tell me to stop,” he whispered against my lips, voice ragged.
I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
Instead, I pulled him closer and kissed him harder.
Because yes, I was angry.
Yes, he lied.
But he was Ryder.
He was pain and passion and truth and ruin.
And in that storm…
I wanted to be ruined.
By him.
Only him.
♛┈⛧┈┈•༶༶•┈┈⛧┈♛
Ryder’s POV
She was crying.
Not the quiet kind of cry.
Not the tear sliding down the cheek kind.
This was raw. Wrecked.
Her fists slammed into my chest, and I didn’t stop her.
I took it. Every hit. Every goddamn word.
“You lied to me, Ryder,” she choked.
“I trusted you… I loved you. And you let me fall for your ghost.”
“I never meant to—”
“You let me marry him!” she screamed, and those words hit harder than any bullet ever had.
Ashlyn, broken in my arms, was a vision I swore I’d never see again. I would’ve burned down the world to keep her safe from this.
But I was the one who made her cry.
And still—
Her hands pounded my chest again, weaker now.
Like even anger was tired.
“You broke me,” she whispered.
My arms wrapped around her on instinct. My grip was too tight, too desperate. “Then let me fix it.”
She shoved at me again. “You don’t get to walk back in like you didn’t rip me apart.”
“I never walked away,” I said, my voice barely holding. “I was taken. Locked away. Used like a puppet while my brother wore my skin.”
She curled into me then, even while her words begged me to go away.
But her body—
It still leaned into mine.
And I held her like it was the last time I’d ever feel alive.
“I’m here now,” I whispered against her hair.
That’s when she broke completely.
Her sobs tore through the rain, through the ache in my chest, through everything.
And all I could do…
Was hold her tighter.
She wept like I was the safest hell she'd ever known. And maybe I was. A devil who only knew how to love by destruction.
I kissed the top of her head. "I'm sorry, Ash... God, I'm sorry."
When she finally collapsed into my arms, spent and breathless, I cupped her jaw and leaned my forehead to hers.
“You done yelling at me now?”
She sniffled, eyes swollen. “No.”
I smiled.
Then I kissed her.
I claimed her.
Our lips collided like the storm above. No patience. No mercy.
Just fire.
My hands roamed her body, needing her closer, anchoring me to something real—because I didn’t deserve this… but I needed it.
Her mouth opened under mine, and the kiss deepened—our breaths mingling like a language only we spoke.
I didn’t care who we used to be.
All I cared about was this.
Her.
Me.
Now.
But then—
A sharp burn ripped through my side.
I flinched, barely.
But she felt it.
Her hand brushed against my shirt—
Wet.
Sticky.
Warm.
She pulled back.
Eyes wide.
Her fingers trembled as they lifted and met her gaze.
Blood.
“Ryder…” her voice cracked. “You’re—”
My knees gave out.
I caught her wrist as I fell, still trying to hold onto the only thing I ever loved.
- Writer
