I Refused To Be His Second Best Chapter 13

I Refused To Be His Second Best Chapter 13

Stellan never wanted Odessa in the beginning.

Faye liked Ronan. Ronan liked Odessa.

And Faye-she couldn’t stand it.

She wanted Ronan to move on, so she kept pushing Stellan to go after Odessa.

She wore him down. He agreed.

He’d always been that way with Faye.

Whatever she wanted, he gave in.

He thought winning Odessa over would take time.

But it didn’t.

One bouquet. One dinner. One confession.

And she was his.

The first year, his heart never stirred.

When they kissed, his mind drifted.

When they argued, he didn’t bother making up.

He never thought she’d mean anything to him-not the way Faye did.

Until he tore his Achilles tendon playing basketball and ended up in the hospital.

She took time off work to stay with him.

The first night after surgery, the pain woke him.

Half-asleep, he saw her crying quietly over his injury.

That was the first time he’d felt anything real for her.

After the breakup, when he tried to win her back, she said no.

And for the first time, Faye turned to him-with all the warmth she’d never shown.

She made it clear she wanted to be with him.

He’d waited years for that moment.

He thought he’d be happy.

But he felt nothing.

Instead, he kept thinking about Odessa.

He remembered a time he found an old chemistry test among a stack of her books.

It was from freshman year of high school.

The handwriting in the name column was his.

She’d told him she hated chemistry.

That was when it hit him-why a girl Ronan couldn’t win had given herself so easily to him.

She’d been carrying a torch for him for three years.

He held that test paper, drowning in regret.

The second Christmas after the breakup, Stellan finally met the man who held Faye’s heart.

His plane went down. He survived.

Walking out of the terminal, he saw her standing at the exit, searching the crowd.

Hope surged in him.

He thought fate was giving him a second chance.

But before he could call her name, she ran past him and threw herself into the arms of the man

behind him.

That was when it finally clicked.

The weight of what he’d done hit him all at once.

This was what she’d felt for two years.

Being invisible. Being second. Being never chosen first.

She’d endured it for two years.

Fate had given him that same time. But he’d wasted it.

And now there was no turning back.