First Love or Husband? I Choose Neither Chapter 09

First Love or Husband? I Choose Neither Chapter 09

Declan had never been hard to win over.

He was the kind of man you could get if you chased him shamelessly enough and refused to back down.

A lot of girls at school liked him. They just didn’t have the nerve to go after him the way I did.

Maybe it was because I had grown up privileged and adored, the kind of girl confidence came to as naturally

as breathing.

Even when I got rejected, I was never the type to hang my head and walk away embarrassed.

So in the end, I won.

What was supposed to be one year turned into four.

Back then, nothing had happened to my family yet, so I loved with the the unburdened heart of a girl who

knew nothing of winter.

I enjoyed being in love. I mapped out a life that had him in every corner.

I had even thought, more than once, about secretly getting married to him and shocking my parents with the

news afterward.

Then fate struck first.

“Celeste, your father had a stroke.”

“Come home. Now.”

That day, I didn’t even stop to change clothes before I called a rideshare and rushed to Halewick General.

My father, the pillar of our world, was a ghost of himself in the ICU.

My mother, who had once seemed permanently elegant and effortlessly beautiful, looked like she had aged

ten years overnight.

The second I saw them, I burst into tears.

“What happened?” I asked. “What happened to us?”

My mother wiped at her face, crying so hard she could barely get the words out.

“Your brother was set up over a project. Now no one even knows where he is.”

She choked on the next breath. “Your father went to the company, and that’s when he collapsed.”

Her hands shook in her lap. “Now there are people everywhere, at the office, at the house… creditors,

investigators, people demanding answers…”

Then she looked at me like I was the only thing she had left. “Celeste, what are we supposed to do?”

It took me a long time to fully understand what had happened.

Later, after meeting with the company’s legal team, I learned just how bad it was.

My brother hadn’t just made a mistake. He had blown a crater through everything. Bribery.

Fraudulent materials.

Embezzlement tied to construction contracts.

If every charge stuck, he could spend the rest of his life in prison.

For days, I followed the company lawyers around, helping liquidate what could be sold, restructuring what could be salvaged, trying to stop the bleeding with with the trembling hands of an amateur.

That was when I finally understood how hard my father had worked to hold our family together.

But no matter what I tried, I couldn’t patch the hole my brother had torn open.

I didn’t know enough. I wasn’t enough.

Night after night, I cried until there were no tears left, then sat awake until morning.

And then Adrian came to my door.

He stood there with the terrifying calm of a man who owned the future.

“Celeste,” he said, “marry me.”

His voice was calm, steady, practical. “I can fix what’s in front of you.”

I stared at him, this man I had grown up with, and felt my chest tighten.

In the end, I nodded.

I had run out of road.

The first thing I did when I got back to campus was find Declan and break up with him.

“Declan, we’re done.”

I watched the light in his eyes fade, little by little.

He looked at me like he couldn’t tell whether I was joking or being cruel. “Stop it,” he said. “Celeste, that’s not funny.”

I smiled and shook my head, then looked at him with deliberate contempt.

“I was just having fun,” I said. “I have a real life waiting for me. A real marriage.”

Then I gave him the cleanest cut I could.

“Goodbye, Declan.”

I severed every path back to him.

The very next day, I left school in a rush. Adrian even arranged for someone else to collect my diploma later because I never went back for it myself.

Declan, and the four years I had loved him, were sealed away the moment I married Adrian.

Then we reconnected.

And he looked at me and asked, “Still embroiled in that lawsuit?”

Then, with that same steady voice, “Mind if your ex-boyfriend becomes your lawyer?”

I had thought life was finally turning in my favor. I had thought maybe this time the broken pieces would come back together for me too.

Later, I found out it had only been moonlight reflected in water.

Beautiful from a distance.

Untouchable the second I reached for it.

When I woke up, all I saw was a white ceiling.

Someone nearby was breathing heavily.

I turned my head, and when I saw who it was, I froze.

It was Declan.