He Loved Me for Looking Like Her

He Loved Me for Looking Like Her.

NOVEL STATUS: COMPLETED

PUBLISHED CHAPTERS: 12 CHAPTERS

He Loved Me for Looking Like Her – Sneak Peek

The first thing Thane Eddington did when he landed was call me. Not text — call, as if the extra seconds between a read receipt and my voice were more than he could stand.

He arrived at my apartment door with his tie loosened and his hair slightly disheveled from the flight, and before I could say anything, he asked: “Are you actually agreeing? You’re not going to disappear on me again?”

“I’m not disappearing.” I stepped back to let him in. “Sit down.”

“You ran off to Highcrest after the proposal. For two months I’ve been—” He stopped himself, took a breath. “I’m sorry. I didn’t come to make accusations.”

Seeing the flush on his cheeks — the specific pink of someone trying not to cry — I felt something loosen in my chest. “Getting married is a big step,” I said. “You should be prepared. Once I’ve settled my affairs here properly, I’ll come back to Bellhaven. We’ll do it right.”

Thane looked at me for a long moment, the way you look at something you weren’t sure you’d get to keep.

“Thank you,” he finally said, “for giving me another chance.”

He wasn’t performing. He never performed. That was probably what I’d taken longest to understand about him.

𝗤𝗎аl𝗂𝗍𝘺 𝘵𝗿an𝘀𝗅𝗮𝗍iо𝗇𝘀 𝘰n 𝗀𝖺𝗹𝗻𝗈𝘷𝗲l𝗌.c𝗼m

After he left, I called a moving company and started packing in earnest. I had boxes open on every surface, books stacked on the floor, the closet half-emptied, when I heard the key in the lock.

Cedric.

He stopped in the doorway and surveyed the apartment — my boxes, my carefully organized chaos, the evidence of my imminent departure — and said, with that voice he used when he was about to be very reasonable at me: “Roslyn Ashford. What’s going on here?”

I set down the box I was holding. I looked at his face — that face I’d spent three years memorizing, learning all its moods and angles — and said clearly: “I want to go back to Bellhaven.”

He smiled. Not warmly. “All this because I interrupted the proposal?”

I waited.

“Isolde fell rushing down the stairs to get to my ceremony. You know what she does — she’s a dancer. Her legs are everything to her.”

“And how is her injury?”

“A terrible bruise.” He said it the way someone says a terrible bruise when they mean something closer to a mortal wound. “She has a performance in a few days. I hope it doesn’t affect her.”

I couldn’t help it. I laughed.

“Something funny?”

“She interrupted your marriage proposal for a bruise.” I picked up another sweater, folded it. “She must be very fragile.”

The temperature in the room dropped several degrees. Cedric was handsome when he was angry — it was one of his most effective qualities — but I’d gotten used to it.

“What she could lose is a perfect performance. That’s not comparable to a proposal. She’s an heiress, Roslyn. An artist.” He straightened slightly. “Stop making this a scene. I’ll propose to you again.”

Again. As if the word alone were an act of generosity.

I found myself doing the math I’d done before and always managed to stop. How many times had I waited? How many times had the right moment been delayed by someone else’s emergency? I put the sweater in the box. I picked up another one.

“There’s no need for another proposal. I just want to go to Bellhaven and clear my head.”

I reached for my suitcase.

-Continue in He Loved Me for Looking Like Here chapter 1 –