Not the Bride He Wanted novel · Chapter 22 of 24

Chapter 22: My Sister

Magnus started to get up out of the chair.

I put my hand flat on his chest.

"She asked for me," I said.

He looked at me for a long moment.

Then he sat back down.

"I'll be at the window," he said. "Not because I don't trust you. Because I don't trust her."

"That's fair."

My sister was sitting on the front step in the red coat with her knees pulled up.

There was snow on her shoulders, and her curls had gone flat with it.

She had no suitcase.

She stood up when the door opened.

Her face was bare.

I hadn't seen her without pink lipstick since she was thirteen.

"Mama locked the door," she said. "She put my things on the porch in garbage bags. She said she can't look at me."

"Where's Dad?"

"The elders gave him till Friday to get out of the Alpha's house. He's sitting in the kitchen. He didn't even say my name."

Her voice broke on the last word.

It was the first time in her life I'd heard it break when nobody was watching.

"I didn't have anywhere else," she said. "That's not a trick. I just didn't."

"I know."

"Can I come in?"

"No."

She flinched.

I came down one step, so we were level.

"You can say what you came to say," I said. "Out here."

She wrapped her arms around herself.

"I'm sorry," she said.

I waited.

"I don't know how to say it better than that. Daddy always said you'd be fine. Whatever happened, Brenna lands on her feet."

She looked up at me.

"So I took things. Because you'd be fine."

"I wasn't fine."

"I know that now."

"You know it because you lost."

She didn't argue.

That was new too.

"Here's what's going to happen," I said.

I held out my hand.

"Give me your phone."

She gave it to me without asking why.

I opened the Lake packs' page and turned the screen to face her.

"You put it up there for four thousand shares," I said.

"You take it down the same way. In your own words, under your own name. Now."

Her hands shook.

She typed for a long time, and she didn't let me see until she was done.

Then she held it out.

I lied about my sister. Every word. She never did anything to me but tell the truth. I'm sorry, Brenna.

"Post it," I said.

She posted it.

I watched the little circle spin and stop, and the phone started buzzing in her hand before she could put it away.

Then I took a bus ticket out of my coat pocket.

I'd bought it on my phone at four in the morning, while the man I married slept with his arm across me.

"The Marquette station," I said. "Eleven o'clock. It goes south to the Bridge and on downstate to Grand Rapids."

She took it and stared at it.

"That's all?"

"That's all."

"No money? No...?"

← Chapter 21 · All chapters · Chapter 23 →

Want to keep talking to characters like these? Chat with AI romance characters: AI Boyfriend · AI Girlfriend · Dark Romance · Fantasy Romance · BL (Boys’ Love) · Billionaire Boyfriend · Mafia Boyfriend · Possessive Boyfriend · Hockey Boyfriend · Older Boyfriend · K-Drama Boyfriend · Anime Boyfriend · Vampire Boyfriend · Werewolf Boyfriend · Demon Boyfriend · Fae Romance · GL (Girls’ Love) · Anime Girlfriend · Goth & Alt Girlfriend · Gamer Girlfriend · Tsundere Girlfriend · Fantasy Girlfriend