She Wore My Dress, She Married My Groom, She Planned My Love Chapter 06

She Wore My Dress, She Married My Groom, She Planned My Love Chapter 06

The next day, Torin went back to the Halcyon Grand and pulled the security footage from outside the bridal

suite.

The video showed me leaving the room with my suitcase.

Cambria approached from the opposite direction. As she passed me, she paused for a beat before her shoulder struck mine.

I lost my balance and fell backward into the suite.

A few seconds later, Torin followed me inside.

The camera couldn’t see what happened in the room, but it clearly caught Cambria looking down at the toes

of her white heels before she left.

There were drops of my blood on them.

She had seen the blood.

And she had still clutched her stomach and taken everyone away with her.

Torin showed her the footage.

Cambria looked rattled for only a second before she started crying.

“My dress was so heavy. I lost my balance.”

“I saw the blood, but I thought Veda had just gotten her period.”

“Then my stomach started hurting. I was terrified something was wrong with the baby. I couldn’t think about anything else.”

She had an explanation for everything.

But put together, none of it sounded believable anymore.

This time, Torin didn’t comfort her.

He simply took the phone and went into his study.

After that, he started watching the wedding footage over and over.

He watched me ask whether those ninety-nine days he spent pursuing me had all been fake.

He watched Cambria claim that she had chosen the breakfasts, planned the dates, and coached him through every confession.

But Torin knew better than anyone that she had lied.

Seven years ago, he had been the one waiting outside my dorm every morning.

He had remembered that thated cilantro, that my blood sugar dropped easily, and that my knee ached whenever it rained.

He really had loved me then.

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At the wedding, he hadn’t corrected Cambria.

By that point, I had already saw their marriage certificate. He had only wanted the confrontation over as quickly as possible so Cambria and the Sayer family could avoid a public scandal.

Only now did he understand what his silence had cost.

By saying nothing, he had let Cambria turn all seven years of our memories into another lie.

For the first time, Torin sent me a long message.

[Veda, Cambria didn’t tell me to do any of those things.]

[I pursued you because I wanted you. Because I really did love you.]

(I just found out about the baby. Tell me where you are. I’ll come get you.]

The messages still wouldn’t go through.

Sitting alone in the dark, Torin suddenly remembered the first time I had miscarried.

I had called him seventeen times that day.

He told me he was away on business. In reality, he had been on an island celebrating Cambria’s birthday.

Later, I had asked him one question.

“If something really happened to me one day, would you regret it?”

What had he said?

“Don’t try to scare me with things like that.”

Now I was really gone.

And he couldn’t even get a single apology through to me.

My family didn’t change overnight either.

At first, Mom still messaged me every day.

Dad told me to think about the family’s reputation.

Corbett told me not to cut off my own parents over “one accident.”

I answered none of them,

A month later, Mom went to my apartment to pack some of my things.

At the back of my closet, she found the medical records from my first miscarriage.

For the first time, she saw the emergency-contact call log. Torin, Dad, Morn, Corbett-every name had the same note beside it: NO ANSWER.

The date was Cambria’s birthday. The day they had all been on that island with her.

Mom sat with the record for a long time.

That night, she didn’t message me to lecture me about being selfish or unreasonable.

Instead, she sent: [Veda… did it hurt that day?]

I still didn’t answer.

Two months later, Dad went to my apartment and found a stack of wedding invoices inside a drawer.

The gown, the Halcyon Grand, the wedding favors, even the diamond veil Cambria had worn-every bill had my name on it.

Underneath them was the original invitation for the Viremont project.

On the back, Torin had written:

[Veda, don’t go. We’re about to have a home of our own.]

For the first time, Dad sent me an apology without excuses.

[Veda, I’m sorry. I failed you.]

I stared at it for a while.

Then I deleted it.

Regret that came this late couldn’t change the fact that I had gone through two losses alone.

And it couldn’t give me back the two children I never got to hold.