My Fiancé Married My Best Friend, So I Walked Away

My voice came out hoarse. "I'll sign." Carter froze first. He hadn't expected me to agree so easily. Before he could think twice, he rushed over and grabbed my wrist. There was something in his voice he didn't even seem to notice. A hint of panic, almost as if he were afraid of losing me. "Are you sure about that?" His eyes caught the blood on my hand, and his brow furrowed. Like it was a nuisance, he opened his phone and placed an order for bandages. But bandages were never going to be enough. They couldn’t even begin to cover the wounds inside me. "Carter, are you ordering spicy crawfish for me?" Vanessa slipped her arm through his and gazed up at him with wide, innocent eyes. "You really do read my mind. You knew I was craving it." She went up on tiptoe and kissed him on the cheek. Red crept across his ears. He quickly backspaced over the word bandages he'd just typed, then deleted it. Instead, he ordered three different flavors of spicy crawfish. When his gaze met mine, he looked a little guilty. "I'm ordering a lot. You might as well have some too." I gave a bitter laugh. "I can't eat spicy food and I'm allergic to shellfish." I took a shaky breath, fighting back the sting behind my eyes. "And where are my bandages?" "I'm sorry, Lauren, it's my fault. I was just craving it so badly." "I'll order yours right now. Please don't be upset." Vanessa was always telling me not to be upset. As though I were some hysterical woman who couldn't control herself. "No need!" "She's got her own hands, hasn't she? Let her order them herself." Carter gently covered her phone with his hand. Then he looked up, his gaze full of disgust. "Hey! Stop trying to scare Vanessa." "She's not like you. She’s sensitive and needs someone to look after her." I stood there in stunned silence. Then I let out a short, bitter laugh. He used to say gently, "My Lauren is strong. She's brave. She's got a big heart." "But I know you're the one who's hurt the most, the one wronged the most, and I can't stand to see you like this." He used to cherish me so much that he couldn’t bear to see me hurt. Now, he didn’t hesitate to tear me down just to defend another woman. I stopped waiting for a bandage that would never come. I quickly signed the contract, then strode out without looking back. "Tsk. Playing it so cool." "She'll be crawling into Carter's bed before the night's out." The door shut behind me, cutting off Jordan's sneering voice. All these years, no matter what Carter and I had argued over, the moment he sent me a single comma, I knew he was ready to back down and admit he was wrong. And I'd curl up in his arms, pleased with myself, and let the whole thing go. Just as I was boarding the bus, the comma came again. This time I ignored it and turned off my phone. But a moment later, Wesley called, his calls coming one after another. "Lauren! Come back, hurry!" "You wouldn't answer Carter, so he panicked and chased after you and got hit by a car!" My heart lurched. Without thinking, I banged on the bus door in a panic and rushed back off. My hands flew to my belly. But my knees hit the hard, uneven pavement. I bit back a cry of pain, wrapped both arms around my belly, and stumbled back toward them, blood running down my legs. But before I could reach them, Spencer's laughter rang out from up ahead. "What an idiot. She actually came back." "Carter, you won the bet again. Pay up, buy us dinner." In that instant, the pain in my knees faded into insignificance. All that was left was my heart, as if it had been plunged into saltwater, every raw nerve burning. I turned to leave, favoring my injured leg, only for Carter to seize me by the arm from behind.

A stab of pain ripped through my lower abdomen, radiating through my entire body. My hand went to it on instinct. Carter knew he was in the wrong, and his voice softened a little. "Lauren, stop sulking, okay?" "You can't actually live without me. Why do you keep pretending you can?" The harder I tried to wrench myself free, the tighter he gripped. And little by little, his patience wore thin. "I've been with you for five years. I've only been with Vanessa for three." "We'll be together forever, so you'll always have two years more than her. Isn't that enough?" "Even if she gets the wedding and the marriage certificate, you still come out ahead." The slap cracked through the darkness He pressed a hand to his cheek, his face turned to the side by the force of the blow, staring at me like he couldn't believe it. "Lauren! You really are insane!" "You'll never be as gentle as Vanessa, never as graceful and well-bred!" Carter hadn't always been so taken with Vanessa. He used to complain to me about her. "She's so coy all day long, talks like she can't get the words out." "My girlfriend's the one who's open and bright, loves hard, hates hard, full of fire. I love that about you." So that was it. When you stop loving someone, even the things you'd once adored about them become flaws. "Lauren, you've gone too far! Carter just wanted to coax you into coming back." "And instead of being grateful, you hit people like a rabid dog. You're lower than an animal!" Vanessa hurled one insult after another at me. But to Carter, she wasn't the one who looked insane. I let out a bitter laugh. And finally put an end to the last of my wishful thinking. I turned back and accepted the offer from the company that had been trying to recruit me for months. Then I booked a flight abroad for two days later. "Maybe I shouldn't have said that to Lauren just now." "I was wrong. I should go apologize to her." Vanessa hadn't even started to move before Carter pulled her into his arms to stop her. "You were only looking out for me. What's wrong with that?" "The one in the wrong is that ungrateful woman who throws kindness back in your face!" When I got into the taxi, Carter was still shooting me a resentful glare. As if to say all of this was my fault. The familiar streets rolled past my window. Carter and I had walked them together for five years. He'd once carried me on his back over the uneven bricks along the sidewalk. He'd once plucked a branch from that drooping willow and woven it into a ring for me. Beneath that flickering streetlamp, we'd promised each other forever. The driver’s voice suddenly pulled me out of my thoughts. "Young lady, you've cried your eyes swollen. Your mom and dad would ache to see it." I finally noticed my whole face reflected in the glass, streaked with tears. I murmured in acknowledgment and tried to wipe them away with a smile. But no matter how many times I tried, every smile looked worse than the tears. When I got home, I stepped up to the door and waited for the facial recognition system to let me in. But it scanned and scanned and wouldn't open. I thought my face was too swollen from crying, too distorted for the system to recognize. Then Carter called out of the blue. "Forgot to tell you. I deleted your face this morning after I left." "It only stores two faces, and you always come home with me anyway. So I replaced yours with Vanessa." "Carter! This is my wedding home!" He let out a soft laugh. "But the deed is in Vanessa's name." I was trying to say something several times, but couldn't get out a single sound. So the home I'd spent two years carefully choosing. I'd designed every room myself, braved the summer heat to shop for building materials, and gone without food or sleep to oversee the renovations. The wedding home I'd poured everything into, had belonged to Vanessa from the very beginning. I was shaking all over, torn between anger and heartbreak.

A sudden, searing pain tore through my lower abdomen, followed by a horrible dragging sensation. I couldn't stay on my feet anymore. I slid down the wall and collapsed onto the floor. The words spilled out before I could think, panic taking over. "Our baby. Save our baby." His breath caught for a moment. Then came that quiet, mocking laugh, as if he'd already figured out my little scheme. "Vanessa's pregnant, so now you want to copy her. Is that it?" "Thought you'd fake a kid and use a fake pregnancy to get your hands on the house?" "I didn't!" "All right, stop making a scene." "I'll finish up here and come straight back. Just be good and go to sleep." The line went dead. Each word felt like another sentence handed down, each one bringing me closer to death. Blood spread beneath me, bright red and terrifyingly fast. I called him back in a panic. But the dispatcher said I was in a remote residential development. Even under the best circumstances, an ambulance would take more than an hour to get there. The blood wouldn't stop flowing. Then it hit me. Carter's parents lived close by. Their household always kept top private physicians on standby. But when I finally reached his mother, her voice was ice-cold. "My son knows you better than anyone. He said you'd put on an act and call us. He was right." "I did just hire two top obstetric specialists, yes. But they're for Vanessa." "Don't think you can force your way into the Harrington family with filthy little tricks like this. Vanessa is the only daughter-in-law I'll ever accept." The line went dead again, without a shred of hesitation. I pressed my hands against the wall and struggled to my feet, then began dragging myself toward the hospital, one agonizing inch at a time. Every step might buy my baby another second. I had to keep going. Then two blinding headlights swept over me. Carter and the other four got out of the car and walked toward me together. "Well, well. Pretty convincing." "What'd you use, pig's blood or dog's blood?" Jordan's words set the whole group laughing. Vanessa rested a hand on her belly and slipped her arm through Carter's, all sweetness and innocence. "Lauren, it's the middle of the night and you've got blood smeared all over the place. You're scaring me." "You should hurry home and clean yourself up. Don't frighten the baby in my belly." Wesley and Spencer came at me from either side. Each of them grabbed an arm and began dragging me toward the house. "Let go of me!" "I have to get to the hospital right now. I have to save my baby!" I tried to wrench myself free. But I was afraid of doing anything that might hurt my baby. In the end, they dragged me all the way back inside. Carter took one look at me, and his expression flickered. His brows knitted together, and he pressed his lips into a thin line. He looked more annoyed than concerned. "I'll take you to get cleaned up." He reached down to pick me up, and I shoved him off. All I could do was scream at him. "Carter! The baby!" "Our baby!" "If you take me to the hospital now, there's still time. Please, just take me to the hospital, okay?" "Lauren!" He bellowed, his patience finally gone, and pressed his fingers hard against his forehead. "How long are you going to keep up this nonsense!" "You always take the pill after we're done, don't you?" "There's no way you could be pregnant!" My breath caught in my throat. I couldn't draw it in or let it out. The pressure in my chest grew unbearable, and my eyes burned. Back when I was focused on building my career, I'd said I didn't want a baby yet. But every time we were out and Carter saw a child, his face would light up, and I could see how badly he wanted one of his own. So I gave in. I wanted him to have a baby sooner, too. I wanted to get married and have a baby this year, to have both of those dreams come true at once. "Lauren, you put your career first." "But I'm not like you. I put Carter first." "Carter knows how much I love him. That's why he was willing to give me the cross necklace your grandmother left you. So I could wear it to keep my baby safe." Vanessa pulled the necklace from beneath her collar and held it up, swinging it tauntingly in front of me. "Give it back!" "That's the only thing my grandmother left me!" I threw myself at her, desperately trying to snatch it back. Carter smacked my hand aside. "It's just a cheap iron necklace!" "If you like it, I'll buy you another one! Why are you so obsessed with taking hers?" "That one is mine!" "Mine!" I lunged at her again, beyond caring how I looked. Vanessa easily dodged out of the way, then deliberately crumpled to the floor. My belly slammed hard into the corner of the table. Blood gushed between my legs. Carter froze where he stood. The paramedics finally arrived. One look at me unconscious on the floor, and one of them rounded on everyone in the room. "What are you doing here? The baby's completely gone now!" The living room went dead silent in an instant. All that was left was the scrape of the stretcher and the hurried movements of the paramedics as they lifted me onto it. Carter stood rooted to the spot.