The sky cried harder than I did.
The rain had started just as the hearse turned the corner toward the cemetery gates—cold, stinging drops that soaked through my veil and down the back of my neck, trailing like icy fingers over my spine. It was fitting, really. This kind of grief didn’t deserve sunlight.
I stepped out of the car, heels crunching against the wet gravel, and the silence swallowed me whole.
I knew what they were thinking.
She’s too young.
She’s too wild.
She’s too… scandalous.
And they were right, in their own pathetic, narrow way. I had been all those things. Still was, beneath the surface. But I was also something more now. Something sharper. Harder.
The kind of woman who could stand over her father’s grave and not flinch.
My dress was black velvet long-sleeved, hig
