In his world, white was for funerals. For death. For endings. But in her world—in the world she’d come from—white was for weddings. For beginnings. For hope.
She looked like a bride. A real bride. Not the black-clad stranger who’d stumbled into his chapel like a beautiful omen.
Mrs. Lyme.
Bailey was talking to Mrs. Lyme, who was looking at her with polite confusion because in this timeline, they’d never met. And Devyn watched the exact moment Bailey realized where she was.Whenshe was.
Her face crumpled. Just for a second. Just long enough for him to see the devastation before she pulled herself together andsaid something to Mrs. Lyme that made the older woman’s brow furrow in concern.
He should pretend he’d never seen her.
He should let her go. That was the plan. That was thepoint.Hurt her so badly she’d leave and never look back. Keep her safe by making her hate him.
Instead, he found himself moving.
Through the estate. Down the stairs. Out the door. Moving with an urgency that was almost clumsy—and Devyn Chaleur wasneverclumsy. He was precision and control and deliberate efficiency. He did not stumble over thresholds. He did not take corners too fast.
He did not chase after women who were better off without him.
And yet.
When he reached the market, she was gone.
He scanned the crowd. The vendors. The side streets. Nothing. No wedding dress. No dark hair. No violet eyes.
A door began to sparkle.
Not a real door. A space between two buildings that hadn’t been there a moment ago, shimmering with that unmistakable light. Hewhay. Opening a passage for him, or perhaps laying a trap. With Hewhay, you never really knew.
He stepped through anyway.
The space beyond was small. Intimate. Warm light, velvet armchairs, the smell of old books and something sweeterunderneath. It looked like a reading nook. A sanctuary. The kind of place someone like Bailey would feel safe.
On a small table in the center sat a book.
Leather-bound. Midnight blue. Silver lettering on the spine that caught the light even though there was no visible source.
Bailey Sutton: The Life She Might Have Lived.
His jaw tightened.
He should leave. Should walk out of this pocket of Hewhay and never look back. What good would it do, seeing the life she could have without him? The happiness she deserved? The safety he could never provide?
But his hands were already reaching for it.
The leather was warm under his fingers. Body temperature. Alive.
He opened it.
THE FIRST PAGE SHOWEDher in a wedding dress.
Not the crumpled silk from the market footage. A different dress, in a different place—a photography studio with exposed brick and high ceilings and natural light streaming through massive windows. She was smiling. Actually smiling, with the dimple he’d memorized showing on her right cheek.
And beside her stood a man.
Golden hair that caught the light like spun sunlight. Chiseled features, elegant and powerful. Hazel eyes warm with adorationas he looked at Bailey—hisBailey—like she was the only thing in the world worth seeing.
The caption beneath read:Paul Theodore,Greek god masquerading as human. Bailey’s Fiancé.
