At Twenty-Eight, He Married My Enemy. At Eighteen, He Gave Me a Second Life. Chapter 07

At Twenty-Eight, He Married My Enemy. At Eighteen, He Gave Me a Second Life. Chapter 07

A full week passed.

Ethan touched the wound on his chest, now beginning to scab over, and still felt as though everything that had happened that day had been a dream.

He told the police that the person who stabbed him was his eighteen-year-old self.

They didn’t believe him at all.

The officer taking his statement even suggested that he undergo a psychiatric evaluation.

Then Ethan tried to report that his eighteen-year-old self had taken Eileen to another world.

The police still refused to open a case.

“Mr. Grant, please stop wasting police resources. Even if Ms. Carter really is missing, you’re neither her spouse nor her family. Even if we find her, we have no obligation to tell you where she is.”

The officer paused.

“And maybe cut back on the science fiction.”

When Ethan walked out of the Chicago Police Department, he felt truly powerless for the first time in his life.

If Eileen had gone to another city, he could search the entire country.

If she had gone to another country, he had enough money to hire the best private investigators in the world.

But she had gone to another time.

Where was he supposed to look for her?

Just like that, Eileen vanished completely from his life.

The doctors had warned him over and over that his injury was serious and that he was under strict orders not to drink.

But he couldn’t stop.

Every second he spent sober hurt too much.

Only when he was drunk did brief hallucinations give him a little relief.

For a little while, it felt as though Eileen were still sitting beside him.

One night, after drinking until he could barely think straight, the wound in his chest tore open again.

Then Ethan suddenly saw a familiar figure standing by the door.

“Eileen?”

He threw his arms open.

“You’re back?”

But all he embraced was empty air.

Ethan collapsed back onto the couch, tears streaming down his face.

He had cried more in the past week than he had in all twenty-eight years of his life combined.

He had always believed he still loved Eileen.

But he had never thought he loved her so much that losing her would make life unbearable.

He had thought his career, his friends, and Blair could fill his time and keep him from thinking about Eileen.

Until that day.

He had lain there bleeding, nearly killed by his eighteen-year-old self.

His friends had run.

His business partners had run.

Blair hadn’t even looked back.

Only Eileen had saved him.

He would never forget what he felt in that moment. Shock, guilt, regret, and the love he had buried for far too many years all came crashing down on him at once.

At last, he admitted the truth: Eileen was the only person he truly couldn’t lose.

But he had lost her anyway.

Everything he had done had made her give up on him completely.

She would rather follow his eighteen-year-old self back into the past than remain in his time for even one more second.

Ethan staggered to his feet and reached for another bottle.

Then the doorbell suddenly rang.

He froze.

Could it be Eileen?

Without even putting on his shoes, he rushed straight to the door.