Page 85 of Angel

She was regretting her entire decision to dip.

An icy hardness settled in my gut as I listened to her hyperventilate.

‘You made your choice, Eva. You packed your bags and you left.’

‘It was a mistake!’ she sobbed, her voice cracking with that familiar, desperate pitch that used to make me drop everything to fix her shit. ‘I thought I wanted space, but I don’t. I want you. I want our life back. Please, Angel, tell me it’s not too late. Tell me you still love me.’

I glanced through the window at Roxy, who was still fast asleep in my bed.

The peace on her face was a beautiful contrast to the chaos bleeding through my phone.

Months ago, hell, weeks before, I would have given Evangeline my final dollar and my last ounce of energy to make her happy.

Damn, I once believed our forever was the endgame; that the struggle was just part of our poetry.

My rose-colored glasses were now stripped off, and all the emotion churning in me was fury and annoyance as she begged me to get back together.

No fuckin’ way, not after she sabotaged and betrayed me.

‘It’s too late, Eva,’ I clipped. ‘You broke us; you walked away on our most important day. I’m done being the safety net for yet another bad choice you’ve made.’

She gasped at my clinical delivery.

‘So cold, Angel? Do you hate me now? Have you moved on? You’re probably cheating on me,’ she sobbed.

I scoffed in disbelief at her audacity.

‘Me? Betraying you? You’re the one with some explaining to do in that department. Who was it that picked you up at the wedding venue, Evangeline?’ I demanded in a snarl.

‘A friend,’ she whimpered.

‘Yeah? This pal have a name?’

‘I can’t say,’ she stammered. ‘It’s not safe.’

‘Why? Is that because he’s your lover?’

Her silence gave me the answer I needed.

‘Has he now turned on you?’ I drawled.

‘Told you I can’t say,’ she yelled, her delivery rising to a frantic, shrill screech. ‘I regret it all. I hate how everything happened. Let’s try again, let’s elope and get married.’

She had no idea about Roxy and me.

My mouth quirked, letting the silence stretch before delivering the final blow.

‘Can’t, I’m already married.’

She gasped, her breath hitching hard.

‘To fuckin’ whom?’

‘Your sister, Roxy. Courtesy of Reese’s insistence.’

Dead air hung on the line, then Evangeline exploded, breaking into an outraged, blood-curdling howl.

‘Are you out of your fucking mind?! Roxy?! My own sister?! How could anyone do this to me and not say a single freakin’ word?! Why did nobody tell me?!’