CHAPTER 6
MATT’S POV
“Mr Bennett! Mr Bennett! What do you have to say about Ms. Sinclair’s accusations?”
“Is she telling the truth?”
“Does this mean the wedding is officially called off?”
The reporters swarmed me like vultures, microphones thrust into my face, cameras flashing so hard I saw spots. Their voices were too loud, sharp and insistent. I even felt someone’s spittle land on my face.
I turned to the last reporter with fire in my eyes. “No. The wedding still stands.”
I heard gasps spread round the hall and it made my skin crawl.
I managed to push through the chaos of reporters and wedding guests, ignoring the flash of cameras and the million questions thrown at me.
My lungs burned as I burst through the doors, hoping to demand an explanation from Jada, but she was nowhere to be found.
“Where is she!?”
I spun in every direction, desperately searching. She wasn’t at the steps. Not at the fountain. No even among the parked cars. My pulse hammered against my temples as the horrifying realization hit me. Jada was gone.
“Fuck!” I roared, my voice echoing against the stone walls. I stood there, fists clenched, suit jacket hanging off my shoulders, my entire life unraveling in front of the world.
No. She couldn’t just walk away like that. Not after everything I’d done. Not after all the years. She was mine. Jada Sinclair belonged to me.
I stormed toward my car, ignoring the useless driver scrambling out to open the door. I shovec him aside and slid into the seat, slamming it shut so hard that the mirror rattled. My hands gripped the wheel until my knuckles turned white.
The tired screamed as I pulled into the street, driving like a madman. Horns blared at me, but I didn’t care. All I could think about was Jada.
She couldn’t do this to me. She wouldn’t dare. She was just confused. All I had to do was talk to her and she would see reason. She had to.
She would’ve gone home. She had nowhere else to go. She always ran home. And when I got there, she’d have nowhere but my arms to run into.
But when I screeched into the driveway, my chest went cold.
The house was dark. The door was locked. And when I tried to open it, the key didn’t even fit.
“What the hell…” I muttered, shoving it again and again. I tried the back door. Same thing. The locks had been changed.
“Jada!” I shouted, pounding my fist against the wood hard enough to sting. “Open the damn
door!”
I heard nothing. Not even an echo.
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I turned toward the garage, desperate for proof she was still inside. But the moment the doors rolled open, the truth punched me in the gut.
There were stacks and stacks of boxes and trash bags. Every single one with my name scrawled across it in black marker. Next to mine were Maya’s. And Uncle Henry’s.
All of it. Our entire lives shoved into cardboard and dumped like trash.
“No… no, she didn’t…” I whispered, shaking my head.
I ripped the tape off a box and found my clothes stuffed inside. My shirts, my ties. All shoved in like they meant nothing. Another box held my watches and my shoes. Expensive leather folded and crushed as if they were rags.
Jada wasn’t impulsive, so it felt like she’d been planning this the entire time.
I grabbed my phone and dialed her number. The call went straight to voicemail. I called again and again. But still, there was nothing.
I was standing in front of the garage with my hands in my head and my veins threatening to burst through my temples when Uncle Henry’s car pulled up. He got out, his face red with fury and slammed the door so hard the entire car shook.
“You useless idiot!” he bellowed. “One job, Matt! You had one goddamn job! To keep her on leash until the wedding. And you couldn’t even manage that! I should never have trusted you Never!”
“You’ve got it all wrong, I snapped, chest heaving. “This isn’t over. She’ll come back.”
Uncle Henry laughed bitterly, jabbing a finger in my chest. “Open your eyes! She won’t. She’ done with you. And thanks to your little stunt, we’ve lost everything. The company, the house, the inheritance, all gone! You think she’s coming back to you after that?”
“She will,” I growled, teeth grinding. “She loves me. She always has.”
His lips curled in disgust. “You’re a pathetic idiot.”
And then he stormed off, climbing back into his car and peeling out of the driveway, tires spitting gravel.
I stood there with my fists trembling, until I heard the sound of sobbing.
Maya.
She was sitting on the curb, mascara streaking down her face, surrounded by the trash bags with her belongings in them.
“She’s a heartless, ungrateful bitch!” Maya shrieked, throwing a shoe against the garage door “After everything I did for her, after everything I gave up, she threw us out like garbage!”
I didn’t answer.
“She ruined everything, Mattie. Everything! You’re just gonna stand there and let her do this to us? Say something!”
I stared at the dark house with my jaw tight.
“She’ll come back, I muttered. “She always comes back.”
But even as I said it, a cold knot formed in my stomach.
Maya crawled toward me, grabbing my sleeve. “No, Mattie! She won’t! Don’t you get it? She’s
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done with you. She doesn’t love you. She never did!”
I shook her off, my voice low and lethal. “Shut up.”
“She doesn’t deserve you!” she cried, clutching my arm again. “I’m the one who’s always been here! I’m the one who loves you! What about me, Mattie? What about me?”
Her desperation made my skin crawl. I yanked my arm free, glaring down at her.
She didn’t matter. None of it mattered.
Only Jada.
Always Jada.
I turned back to the house. My heart was pounding like a war drum. I wasn’t sure I believed my own words anymore.
But I knew Jada Sinclair. And I knew just how to get her to come out of her hiding place.
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