Chapter 65

Chapter 65
Lila

The emergency room hummed with fluorescent efficiency—antiseptic smell, beeping monitors, a tired resident with gentle hands wrapping my swollen ankle. Each probe sent fresh pain radiating up my leg, and I bit down hard enough to taste blood.

Elias stood beside me throughout, one hand resting on my lower back, the other curled into a fist at his side. His knuckles were already bruising from where they'd connected with Leo's face, and I couldn't stop staring at them with a complicated tangle of gratitude and guilt.

"Mild ligament strain," the resident announced, stripping off her gloves. "Keep it elevated and iced for forty-eight hours, stay off it for two weeks. I'll wrap it now, but follow up with an orthopedist in a few days." She glanced at the scrapes on my arms and legs, the torn dress. "The other injuries are superficial but they'll hurt. I'm prescribing pain medication and antibiotic cream. Any allergies?"

I shook my head, watching as she bound my ankle with swift, practiced movements. When she finished and left us alone, the silence stretched heavy between us until I finally met Elias's gaze.

"Tell me what happened," he said quietly, steel underneath the calm. "Everything."

So I did. The storage room confrontation, Leo's proposal that I become his mistress, the slap I'd delivered. Vanessa's deliberate trip, the sickening freefall, Victoria's vicious whispers while I lay injured. I kept my voice clinical, reciting facts, because if I let emotion creep in I would shatter completely.

Elias listened without interrupting, his expression growing progressively darker. His damaged hand uncurled and moved to rest beside my hip on the examination table.

"You did the right thing," he said when I finished, fierce and proud. "Walking away, defending yourself—all of it. You should be proud."

"I should have seen it coming," I said, my voice smaller than I intended. "Should have known Victoria would retaliate after—"

"Stop." His hand moved to cup my face, thumb brushing away a tear I hadn't realized had escaped. "What happened tonight was not your fault. They should be ashamed, not you."

Before I could respond, the door swung open hard enough to make us both jump. Leo stumbled in, his face a mess of swelling and blood, his jaw severely swollen and lip still bleeding. Behind him a nurse grabbed for his arm, but he shook her off violently.

"Lila," he said through his split lip, wild and desperate. "I need to talk to you. Please, just give me five minutes—"

"Get out." Elias's voice was quiet but deadly, shifting to place himself between Leo and me. "You're not welcome here."

Leo's gaze flickered to Elias. "Get out of my way. This is between me and my girlfriend—"

"Girlfriend?" Elias's laugh was sharp and humorless. "Interesting, considering Lila ended your relationship the day she discovered you'd been lying to her for four years. Or did you forget that detail?"

Leo's face flushed ugly red. "We had a fight, but that doesn't mean we're over. People have arguments, they work through—"

"They don't work through betrayal," I said, finding my voice. "They don't work through four years of deception. And they definitely don't work through a proposal to become someone's kept mistress."

Leo's expression crumbled as he realized I'd just exposed his shameful proposition. "Lila, you don't understand. I love you. I've always loved you. Everything I did was to protect you—"

"Enough." Elias straightened to his full height, using his presence to crowd Leo toward the door. "You don't get to claim protection while asking her to debase herself for your convenience."

Leo's jaw clenched. "And who the hell are you to lecture me? You're just another rich asshole trying to take advantage of her vulnerability—"

"So I can what?" Elias took a predatory step forward. "Marry her? Make her my wife? Give her my name and everything I have?"

The words dropped like bombs. I watched the color drain from Leo's face, his eyes going wide with shock.

"That's not possible," he said, voice thin and reedy. "You're lying. She would have told me if—"

"Why would she tell you anything?" Elias's voice was cold and precise. "You forfeited any right to know about her life the moment you chose Victoria Ashford over her. You made your choice. Now live with it."

"Lila." Leo's gaze swung to me, raw and desperate. "Tell me he's lying. Tell me this is just—"

"It's not a lie." My voice came out steady and clear. "Elias and I got married two months ago. We're legally husband and wife."

The silence was suffocating. Leo stood frozen, his face cycling through shock, denial, anger, devastation.

"Two months," he finally whispered. "You married him right after—" He couldn't finish.

"Right after I discovered you'd been lying to me for four years," I said. "Right after Victoria."

Leo stared at me for a long moment, then something hardened in his expression. A cold, bitter smile twisted his swollen lips. "Nice try," he said, his voice taking on a mocking edge. "Very creative, Lila. I have to hand it to you—it's a much more dramatic excuse than just saying you're not interested."

I felt Elias tense beside me. "Excuse me?"

"Come on." Leo's laugh was harsh, humorless. "You really expect me to believe you married him? Two months ago? You barely knew each other. This is just another one of your games, another way to punish me for—"

"It's not a game," I said, but my voice had lost its earlier certainty in the face of his absolute refusal to hear me.

"Sure it's not." Leo took a step closer despite Elias's warning stance. "You're just so desperate to hurt me that you'll say anything, even drag some random billionaire into your little revenge fantasy. Well, I'm not buying it. I know you, Lila. I know you better than anyone, and I know you're lying."

The casual certainty in his voice, the absolute conviction that he still had the right to define my reality, to dismiss my truth as fiction—something inside me snapped. But before I could find words cutting enough to penetrate his delusion, Elias moved.

He turned to me, his hand sliding from my shoulder to cup my face with a gentleness that belied the fury I could see simmering in his eyes. "May I?" he asked quietly, and I understood what he was offering—a demonstration that would leave no room for doubt or denial.

I nodded.

Elias leaned in and kissed me.