Chapter 127

Chapter 127
Violet

I stood on the steps outside the dormitory, the cold wind of early winter sweeping fallen leaves across the ground, brushing past my ankles.

The Maybach's red taillights turned at the end of the street and dissolved completely into the deep Manhattan night.

Moments ago, in the car, Julian had taken a call from his assistant.

Ethan had run away from home.

Though Julian's voice had stayed cold on the phone—he'd ordered every one of Ethan's credit cards and trust funds frozen on the spot—he'd still lowered the window after hanging up to tell me he had to return to the estate. Ethan had left abruptly, leaving a mess behind, and as the head of the Hall family, Julian had no choice but to go back and deal with the tangle of family affairs.

I pulled my coat tighter and looked away.

An uncontrollable irritation rose in my chest.

Whatever I'd once felt for Ethan had curdled into pure disgust. He was forever the overgrown child, a man-baby who, at the first sign of trouble, reached for something as childish as running away just to get attention. He never spared a thought for the punishing pressure Julian faced on Wall Street every single day—he only knew how to cause trouble, again and again.

I turned and reached out to push open the heavy glass door of the building.

At that exact moment, a sudden, frantic rustling came from the bushes beside me.

A tall, dark figure lunged out of the shadows and planted itself directly in my path.

"Violet!"

Startled, I instinctively staggered back two steps, my back slamming hard against the glass door.

In the dim glow of the streetlight, I made out the face before me. It was Ethan.

He looked terrible. His black motorcycle jacket hung wrinkled off his frame, his hair was a wild mess, and his eyes were shot through with red. The stench of alcohol clung to him, mingling with the cold air and hitting me full in the face.

He hadn't run away from home at all—or rather, his idea of running away had been to camp out beneath my dormitory.

"What are you doing here?" My face went cold, my eyes stripped of any warmth.

I wanted nothing to do with him. I slid my hand into my pocket and pulled out my phone to call Julian. Ethan was dangerously unstable right now, and I couldn't let him lose his mind here.

He saw the motion, and something manic flashed in his eyes. He surged forward and snatched the phone out of my hand in one swift motion.

"Give it back!" I snapped, reaching for it.

Ethan held my phone up high, out of reach, his gaze locked on mine. His eyes were terrifyingly bloodshot, his chest heaving—like a cornered animal driven to the edge.

"You want to call him? You're going to go running to that old man to rat me out, is that it?" Ethan ground the words out through his teeth, his voice so hoarse it nearly cracked.

"Ethan, are you finished with this?" I looked at him coldly. "Give me back the phone and get out of my sight—now."

"I'm not finished!" Ethan suddenly roared, his voice echoing across the silent campus. "Violet, tell me the truth—did he force you? Is he leaning on you with the Hall Group behind him? Did he dangle the concertmaster position to lure you into being with him?!"

He was still stubbornly trapped inside his own logic. He refused to believe I could have fallen in love with Julian; he was convinced I was a victim, coerced and manipulated.

Watching him cling to this pathetic self-deception, I no longer even had the energy to be angry.

"Ethan, is that all there is inside your head—these filthy transactions?" I met his eyes without flinching, enunciating each word with perfect clarity. "No one forced me. No one lured me. I confessed to him. I love him, and I am his girlfriend because I want to be. Do you understand?"

Ethan's whole body went rigid.

He stared at me in disbelief, as if I'd said something utterly absurd.

"You confessed?" he murmured, the hope in his eyes crumbling piece by piece. "Impossible... this is impossible. How long have you even known each other? How could you possibly—"

"We've known each other far longer than you think," I cut in flatly.

"Since when?" Ethan seized my shoulders, gripping so hard the pressure ached in my bones. "When exactly did the two of you get together?!"

I wrenched free of his hands, rubbed my aching shoulder, and looked at him coldly. "At Owen's party. We were already together by then."

The air froze solid in that instant.

Ethan's eyes flew wide, his pupils shrinking to pinpoints. He was clearly racing to do the math in his head. Owen's party had been a long, long time ago.

"Owen's party..." Ethan sucked in a sharp breath, his expression twisting rapidly from shock into raw fury. "That early? You were already together that early?!"

He was shaking with rage. He jabbed a finger at my face, his voice warping with anger. "Violet, you're ruthless! You hid it from me all this time! Sneaking around right under my nose, day after day—you were making a complete fool of me, weren't you?!"

"We were under no obligation to report the progress of our relationship to you." My tone stayed cool; I couldn't be bothered to indulge his impotent rage. "Give me back my phone."

"Dream on!" Ethan lurched back a step, his eyes turning venomous. He stared at me, then let out a cold laugh—a laugh laced with the satisfaction of revenge.

"Violet, do you really think you've won?" he said, his voice thick with mockery. "You think Julian actually loves you? You think you'll get to sit pretty as the lady of the Hall Group?"

I frowned slightly and said nothing.

Seeing no reaction, Ethan stepped closer and dropped his voice, hissing like a viper flicking its tongue. "You don't know the first thing about him. You think he's stayed unmarried all these years because he never found the right woman? Don't be so naïve. There's always been a woman in his heart."

My heart skipped a beat.

"A woman he loved and could never have." Ethan bored into my eyes, unwilling to miss even the faintest flicker across my face. "She's his line in the sand, the one he can never let go of. And what are you? Nothing but a pretty young thing he's using to pass the time—a stand-in, a placeholder!"

The early-winter wind blew colder, sliding down my collar, and I couldn't suppress a shiver.

Ethan watched the color drain slightly from my face and smiled wider, triumphant. "Violet, take my advice—break it off with him now, while you can still keep some dignity. The moment that woman comes back, you won't even get a title. He'll kick you aside without a second thought and send you packing out of Manhattan!"

Inside my pocket, my fingers curled into a tight fist, nails biting into my palm. I used the small sting of pain to hold my surface calm.

I couldn't show Ethan a single crack. I couldn't let him think his manipulation had landed.

I drew a deep breath, lifted my chin, and looked at him with utter contempt.

"Ethan, have you really sunk so low that you have to sow discord with a lie this cheap?" I let out a cold laugh, my voice dripping with derision. "Your tricks are pathetically childish."

The smile froze on Ethan's face.

"I trust the kind of man Julian is." I looked him dead in the eye, my voice steady. "Whatever his past may hold, the person he's chosen now is me. Pack up your ridiculous little games. All you're doing is making yourself look even more pitiful."

"You—!" My words pushed Ethan over the edge.

He raised the phone in his hand as if to hurl it at me. I didn't dodge—I just stared at him coldly.

In the end, he didn't throw it at me. He slammed it down onto the lawn beside us with a dull thud.

"Violet, you're going to regret this!" Ethan spat the words through gritted teeth, then turned and stumbled off into the dark street. His figure vanished quickly from sight.

Silence settled over everything once more.

I stood where I was, staring in the direction he'd gone. Only after a long while did I walk slowly to the edge of the lawn, bend down, and pick up my phone. The screen had splintered into a web of cracks, but it still lit up.

Gripping the phone, I turned and pushed through the glass door, stepping into the warm corridor.

The hallway was quiet, filled only with the sound of my own footsteps.

I'd been flawless in front of Ethan. I'd mocked him. I'd told him I trusted Julian. But only I knew the storm that had churned up inside me the moment he'd said those words—a woman he loved and could never have.

Julian was fourteen years older than me.

Over those fourteen years, what had he been through? Who had he loved? I knew nothing. He was too composed, too perfect—so perfect that at times he seemed almost unreal to me. I'd always assumed the emptiness at his side was because he was consumed by his work, because he had no patience for the scheming of society women.

But what if there really had been a woman who'd once claimed his heart? What if that woman truly was the untouchable line in the sand buried deep within him?

I stopped outside my door, my hand on the knob, unable to make myself press down.

I knew I shouldn't let a few words of provocation from someone like Ethan make me doubt Julian—that would be foolish. And yet those words, the one he could never have, were like a drop of ink falling into clear water, spreading fast, impossible to wipe away.