Before His Wedding, the Good Girl He Used Quietly Vanished Chapter 04

Before His Wedding, the Good Girl He Used Quietly Vanished Chapter 04

Her reply came fast.

[Tonight. Bellwether City. Everything’s set. He won’t find you.]

I locked my phone and pressed it to my chest.

My heart hammered.

I could feel my pulse in my fingertips, my sweating palms warming the metal case.

Bellwether City.

I’d read about it a hundred times.

Bellwether River. Beacon Tower. Golden sycamores in the fall.

Everett had asked me once if I wanted to go. I told him no.

I told him about other places instead: Alderbrook, Briarhaven, Lake Aveline. Every time, he said the same thing. “I’ll take you when I have time.”

He never had time.

Bellwether City was the one place I never mentioned.

Not because I didn’t want to go.

I wanted it so much I couldn’t risk saying it out loud.

Because if I told him, he’d just say it again: “I’ll take you when I have time.”

And that one sentence would flatten the only hope I’d been quietly keeping alive.

I was waiting for the day he looked at me a little longer. Cared a little more. Then I’d tell him.

And we’d just go. No planning, no promises about someday.

Not another empty promise. Not another “when I have time.”

But that day never came.

Maybe that was for the best.

This time, I’d take myself. I didn’t need him to give me that anymore.

I didn’t ask Miss Holloway about her and Everett.

Was the arranged marriage real? Was she actually pregnant?

I didn’t care anymore.

Everett said he wasn’t done with me yet.

I couldn’t get out on my own.

She was my way out. And I was hers.

I heard him calling from downstairs.

His voice came up through the floor, muffled. “Willa, your oatmeal’s getting cold.”

I slipped my phone into my pajama pocket and took a deep breath.

“Coming.”

His brow furrowed slightly when he saw me come down. Probably wondering what took me so long.

“What took you so long?”

“I changed my clothes,” I said.

I hadn’t.

But he’d never notice something like that.

He never looked at what I was wearing. Only at whether I was behaving.

“Eat.” He flipped his phone face-down on the table. “Get some rest when you’re done. I’ll drive you after.”

“Where?”

“To campus. Don’t you have classes this morning?”

Oh.

He remembered my schedule.

Two lectures every Tuesday morning. He’d always known.

I used to think that meant he cared.

Now I knew the difference between paying attention and actually caring.

“Okay.”

I sat down and ate.

He leaned back in his chair and watched me.

“Pack a bag,” he said. “I’m taking you somewhere tonight.”

“Where?”

“You’ll see when we get there.”

I didn’t push it.

I never asked too many questions.

Too many questions annoyed him. And when he got annoyed, he’d give me that look—the one that said I’d crossed the line.

I didn’t want to see that look again. Not once. Not ever.

Whatever patience he still had for me, I needed to ration it.

I just had to play the part a little longer. His last good girl.