My Best Friend’s Secret Plan, My Dead Husband’s Watching Eyes Chapter 04

My Best Friend’s Secret Plan, My Dead Husband’s Watching Eyes Chapter 04

Graham was alive.

Everything the comments said was true.

Three months. They’d been playing me for three months, and I’d fallen for every second of it. My eyes burned.

I moved toward Graham without thinking.

“Maren!”

Miles caught my hand and laced his fingers through mine.

To everyone watching, we looked like a couple in love.

“I knew you’d come around. You still love me.”

I looked into Graham’s eyes.

My jaw was shaking. I couldn’t pull my hand free.

“Miles, are you out of your mind? I never said…”

His grip on my wrist was brutal, the pressure biting down to the bone, but his face never stopped smiling.

To anyone watching, he was just a groom whispering something sweet to his bride.

“Shh. Smile for me. We’re getting married.”

He pulled me toward the stage. I twisted around, searching for Graham.

His ghost had been beside me this whole time. He had to know I didn’t want this.

I didn’t want to die.

“Graham…”

But the second I turned, Vanessa stepped between us.

“Pull yourself together. Graham is dead. Miles is your husband now.”

Miles and Vanessa hauled me onto the stage.

Graham stood in the crowd, watching. He didn’t move.

His face was blank. And that blankness terrified me more than rage ever could.

He didn’t believe me. Why would he? Miles and Vanessa had made sure every piece of evidence pointed one way.

But I didn’t want to die.

I bit down on my lip so hard I tasted blood. Then I shoved them both off me.

“I’m not marrying him!”

Vanessa’s voice cut across the room. “Maren!”

“Enough! You’re over three months pregnant. What are you doing? Do you want your baby to grow up without a father?”

The room swayed. A ringing filled my ears.

“What the hell are you talking about?”

“I’m not pregnant!”

Vanessa’s mother shook her head, feigning pity and patience.

“Maren, sweetheart, don’t deny it. I did your ultrasound myself yesterday. I have the report right here.”

Someone flashed the ultrasound report up on the big screen.

I didn’t even get a word out before the crowd erupted.

“Wait. Graham’s only been dead three months and she’s four months along? She was cheating on him while he was still alive?”

“Unbelievable. And she still took all that money from the Ashfords?”

“If Graham could see this, he’d come back from the dead just to make her pay.”

The voices crashed over me from every direction, every angle, all of them vicious.

I screamed back at them over the noise.

I pounded my fists against my flat stomach, over and over, to prove there was nothing there. Nobody stopped me.

Not a single person listened.

“Baby, please. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry. Just don’t hurt our baby. Please.”

Miles dropped to his knees in front of me, eyes red, his performance flawless.

I went quiet. That was all my mom needed. She rushed the stage and slapped me.

“Are you quite done making a scene?!”

“You’re carrying his child. How much longer are you going to do this? Haven’t you humiliated this family enough?”

“After everything you’ve done, Miles is the only man on earth who’d still take you!”

My cheek was on fire.

It hit me all at once. Nothing I said was going to matter.

Vanessa wanted one thing: for Graham to see me as unfaithful. Let him kill me for it. Then she’d step into my place as Mrs. Ashford.

Miles was in love with Vanessa. He’d do whatever she asked.

My own mother had sold me out for $75,000 because I wouldn’t bankroll my brother.

And Graham had watched all of it, watching his wife’s supposed betrayal play out right in front of him.

Every single one of them wanted the same outcome.

Nobody believed me. Nobody cared.

The crowd was still roaring when Graham cut through it, his face a mask, and stopped right in front of me.

The comments. The dream. His hand around my throat. It all rushed back and I couldn’t stop shaking.

“You have to believe me. I thought you were dead. Miles and I never…”

His eyes were bloodshot, the veins nearly bursting.

He raised one hand, the tendons standing out along every knuckle, and brushed his fingers across my cheek. His voice was soft.

“Congratulations.”

Then his hand locked around my throat. His eyes went dead.

That suffocating pressure from the dream was real this time. I clawed at his wrist, and with the last breath I had, I forced out one sentence.

Every face in the room changed.