One Lipstick, Nine Lies, Zero People On My Side Chapter 07

One Lipstick, Nine Lies, Zero People On My Side Chapter 07

Pain exploded across Iona’s back as she hit the floor.

Only then did she understand what Sabine had tried to warn her about.

“Orson learned how to walk away from people from our father. Iona, please don’t confuse loving him with trusting him.”

Sabine had never tried to keep them apart because she looked down on Iona.

She had been trying to protect her.

“I can’t stop you from marrying him. But no matter what happens, I’ll stand beside you, even if the person who hurts you is my own brother.”

At the time, Iona had heard judgment where there had only been concern.

She had convinced herself Sabine was ashamed that her closest friend had grown up in foster care. She had believed Sabine thought she wasn’t good enough to become part of the Hollowell family.

That resentment had taken root and grown until it poisoned everything between them.

Now Iona lay on the floor with pain tearing through her back, but it was nothing compared to the emptiness in her chest.

Sabine had chosen her again and again.

And Iona had betrayed her every time.

The room fell silent.

Leonie suddenly looked around.

“Stellan?”

No one answered.

She turned toward the spot where he had been standing and realized he was gone.

Panic flashed across her face. She pushed past Orson and rushed toward the front door.

Before she could reach it, three police officers entered.

“Leonie Strathmore?”

She stopped.

The lead detective held up his badge.

“We’re investigating an assault reported by Dr. Sabine Hollowell. We also have footage from the home security system.”

He displayed several still images on his tablet.

One showed Stellan’s hand around my throat.

Another showed Iona dragging me into the utility room while Orson and Leonie stood nearby.

The final image showed me collapsed on the floor.

“Leonie Strathmore, Orson Hollowell, and Iona Fenwick, you need to come with us for questioning. Stellan Dacre is also wanted in connection with the assault.”

All three of them froze.

They had never expected Sabine to report them to the police.

The last of Iona and Orson’s hope disappeared.

After everything they had done, Sabine would never forgive them.

The officers quickly escorted the three of them from the house.

—

I hadn’t expected Stellan to find me so quickly.

The door to Room 201 at Kestrel Point Medical Center opened, and he walked in.

He looked at me lying in the hospital bed, guilt written all over his face.

“Sabine. You really are here.”

After watching the security footage, Stellan had finally understood how absurd everything had been.

The baby wasn’t his.

The accusation that I had kidnapped him had been ridiculous from the beginning.

And whatever he thought he had with Leonie had been nothing but a lie.

I lowered the newspaper in my hands and looked at him without expression.

“What are you doing here, Mr. Dacre? In case you’ve forgotten, we’re no longer together.”

“I came to apologize.”

He hesitated before continuing.

“I’m sorry, Sabine. I accused you of something you didn’t do, and I betrayed you.”

The pain in his eyes was impossible to miss.

Stellan regretted everything.

He regretted breaking the promises he had made and hurting the woman he had once loved more than anyone.

Iona had said he had mistaken gratitude for love.

But that wasn’t true.

Stellan sank to his knees beside the bed, and his mind drifted back to a night many years ago.

He had been lying awake in a hospital room, waiting for his third heart surgery.

It might have been his last.

He no longer had much hope, so he begged the night nurse to take him outside in a wheelchair. He wanted one last look at the world beyond the hospital walls.

That was when he saw me.

I was sitting in the healing garden, still reviewing his surgical notes.

Moonlight softened the outline of my face. A strand of hair shifted in the breeze, and I tucked it behind my ear without looking up from the pages.

Stellan stared at me from several feet away.

“She’s beautiful,” he murmured.

The nurse beside him laughed softly.

“That’s Dr. Hollowell. She’ll be leading your surgery tomorrow. She recently returned from an overseas humanitarian field hospital, and she’s one of the best surgeons we have.”

His pulse kicked hard, and he couldn’t tell whether it was his failing heart or something else.

He only knew that, for the first time in months, he wanted to survive.

That night, he had meant every promise he made to himself.

If he survived, he would give me the happiest life he could.

But somewhere along the way, Leonie entered his life and destroyed everything.

He couldn’t even say when it had started to go wrong.

Maybe it was the first time she clung to his hand and cried, “I can’t live without you.”

No one had ever needed him like that before.

Or maybe it was when he found himself trapped between two relationships and chose the easiest way out.

He thought he could handle it.

He thought that as long as I never found out, we could keep living as we always had.

Now, staring at the bloodstained pregnancy-loss report in his hand, he finally understood.

He had lost that life a long time ago.

He had pushed away the woman who had once smiled at him beneath the moonlight and fought with everything she had to save him on the operating table.

And this time, she was never coming back.