Orion’s POV:
I knew what I had done was shitty.
Because I knew this marriage wasn’t something she could just opt out of.
She hadn’t chosen me. Not really. She was chosen for me, and I let it happen. No—I made it happen. Me being alive…me choosing her…it was all me. She had just been groomed.
I hated myself for saying what I did that night, and yet, I still said it. Because I had no other choice. It was the only way I could protect her without telling her a truth that could endanger her life even further….I watched the words leave my mouth like poison slipping into a glass of wine, and I let her drink it.
She had been quiet after that… withdrawn. The kind of quiet that felt loud, like a scream echoing inside a glass jar. I had expected her to grow cold afterwards, to freeze me out, to
