Chapter 42: Truth (River's POV)

I kept fidgeting with her fingers while we both lay in bed. I drew circles on her palm, trailed my finger along the inside of her arm which made her get goosebumps. I looked at her with a smirk. 

"It tickles," she said softly, shrugging. I stared at her. Her hair was messy from what we just did but it didn't look shabby. Her face was flushed, cheeks and the tip of her nose red, her lips were red and looked like someone kissed the shit out of them, ahem, me. I let my gaze drop lower. She only had the blanket covering her but she's lying on her stomach so she's relatively covered. "Pass me a shirt," she laughed, realizing that I was staring. 

"Why?" I sighed. 

"We can't lay naked in bed all day, come on." 

"You're not naked." I lifted the blanket, pointing to her light pink lace underwear. 

"Oi!" she laughed, pulling the blanket back. "That's all I have on." 

"Did you wear that knowing that we'd have sex today?" 

"Maybe," she smirked, hugging the pillow that was under her chin. 

"You're a tease." 

"Give me your shirt, please, hurry." 

I reached over and grabbed the shirt that I was wearing earlier today, off the floor. "Here." 

She went completely under the blanket to pull it on and came out while brushing her hair out of her face with only three buttons done, the first one aside. She buttoned it up all the way and then said against the headboard, her body mirroring mine. 

I snaked an arm around her waist from behind and pulled her into me, removing the distance between our bodies. 

She turned to look at me, her eyebrows raised. 

"I love you," I nodded. 

"You have to nod to emphasize that, huh?" 

I nodded again, more eagerly. 

She laughed, "I love you too." She nodded with it, mockingly. 

I chuckled, kissing her again. We both groaned when my phone started ringing. I grabbed it off my nightstand, reading Ezra's name. I answered, putting it on speaker. "Hello?" 

She put her down on my shoulder after pressing a gentle kiss to it. 

"I talked to her," he sighed. 

"And?" I pressed. 

"And well, fuck you, Grimaldi. She called off the engagement." 

I couldn't help but roll my eyes. "What did she tell you? Who told her to do it?" 

He huffed and paused for a beat. "Pastor Willow." 

Brielle's head lifted off my shoulder. 

"In return for what?" I questioned. 

"A hundred grand." That is... a lot of money. I looked at Brielle who seemed shocked. I saw it coming, but maybe she didn't. I know she was suspicious of her dad when I went to see him that day, but maybe she really didn't think her dad would have paid someone else to sabotage our relationship. 

"River?" 

I snapped out of it, turning my attention back to Ezra. "Did she say anything else?" 

"She said he actually spoke to her about it at your reception party." Which was the first time she flirted with me like that. "And she was trying to find the right moment to make you get caught. Pastor Willow knew you'd be there at the hospital site for work and told her, that's why she showed up." 

"And who took the pictures?" 

"She said she just asked one of her friends to do it for her. Are you happy now?" he scoffed. 

"Ezra, please, shut up, all right? We all know you don't actually like her, you just think she's good in bed. Keep fucking her then. But you should marry someone else, okay?" I huffed in frustration. 

"Do you need anything else?" he asked. 

"No, thanks for helping, by the way." 

"Yeah, yeah, whatever," he mumbled and then hung up. 

"He paid her a hundred fucking grand?!" she exclaimed beside me. "I didn't even think he had a hundred grand to bribe someone." 

"Really? He's a pastor, people pay the church a lot," I mumbled, watching her. 

She frowned, staring at the blanket in her lap. 

"Did you think it would be him?" I asked, grabbing her hand. 

"No," she mumbled, sounding both sad and disappointed. "I thought he might have told her where to find you but I never thought he'd be the one making her do it. And since our reception? God," she groaned, pulling her hand out of mine and covering her face, groaning into her palms. 

"Hey, it's okay." I pulled her hands down, taking one in mine. 

"At least now you know," she sighed. 

"I know? Bri, I... kind of already knew." 

"What?" She blinked in confusion. 

"I had a feeling your dad had something to do with it. Because when we stopped at the cafe that night, coming back from the cliffside, do you remember?" 

She nodded. 

"I saw your dad and Bethany talking there. I was still figuring out what they might have been talking about and then she showed up at my work that day and ruined everything," I huffed. "But I had a feeling your dad created the mess. The reason I asked Ezra to confront her was because I needed to confirm it. I was going to confirm everything and then bring you back home because Alia said I shouldn't see you again until I had answers for you. But then I saw you later and I couldn't help it. I just wanted you to come back with me." 

"Why didn't you tell me you saw them at the cafe itself?" she pouted. 

"Because I didn't want to tell you something that would stress you out. I thought if I knew it then I could tell you the whole thing, I thought that would be better than knowing half of it and worrying over it. But I should have told you, I'm sorry. Maybe if I did, we wouldn't actually be here in this position. Because then we both would have seen it coming and just stayed away from Bethany." 

"Yeah... but she still could have just shown up there and kissed you like she did." 

"Yeah, but at least you wouldn't doubt me like you did." 

"I didn't—" 

"Don't lie now, I know you did. Even if it was only for a split second. It's okay, it's bound to happen. If I saw another guy kissing you, I would still hesitate. That doesn't mean I don't trust you but... you know?" 

She nodded, "I know." 

I sighed, "So I guess the truth finally came out." 

"The truth finally came out," she nodded slowly, zoning out on me. 

"Are you mad?"

"At my father?" 

I nodded. 

"I think I've been mad at him my whole life," she snorted. She shook her head. "I really thought he could change and become better. But I doubt it. I think maybe it's just best for me to never see him again. Or my mother." 

"Her too?" 

"Yeah. She does everything he asks her to, she's like his little puppet. You have no idea how many times I've tried convincing her to divorce him because he doesn't love her and she knows it. And before he started... Before he made my life a living hell, I think she was dealing with the same thing in secret and I just never knew." 

"You really think so?" 

"Mm-hmm. I think it's best for me to just..." She held up her free hand and motioned the snip of scissors with his fingers. "Cut them off. Completely." 

"If that's what you want to do," I nodded. 

"I really should. I think if I don't I'll waste my whole life stuck in one problem or another with them. And anyway, if I cut them off I don't have to go to church," she snickered. 

"Does that mean we're officially atheists?" I asked. 

She laughed, turning to look at me. "Yes, it does." 

"Great," I sighed in relief, leaning in to kiss her. 

"Do you actually not believe in God or do you just say it because I do?" 

"I'm sure God exists but I don't think he does anything for us, honestly. If we want something, we have to work for it, we have to go through shit to get it and it's ours. What does God have to do with that? Does God give me strength? No, that's my motivation. Does God give me ideas? No, that's my mind cooking up some shit." 

She nodded in agreement and we fell in silence for a minute. "You know what I believe in?" 

I looked at her. "What?" 

"The law of attraction and manifestation." 

"You do? I do too. But why do you believe in that?" 

She laughed mostly to herself before covering her face with her hands, shaking her head softly. "No reason." 

"Tell me," I urged, elbowing her. 

"Don't laugh at me, please, I'm begging you." 

"I'll try." 

She turned to look at me. "I think I was in... seventh? No, eighth grade, maybe. And you know how sometimes to manifest something, people script? They put down on paper what they want, imagine it, and let that message go out to the universe?" 

I nodded. 

"Well, I did that back then." 

"What were you manifesting?" 

"A boyfriend," she huffed. 

I bit my lip, urging her to continue. 

"I wanted to meet this guy and I created a very long list. There were thirty-six things on that list." 

"Wow," I chuckled. 

"And the last one was 'he became my husband.' Which... I didn't think that would actually happen. And when Cole and I broke up—" 

"Oh god, not him again," I groaned. 

"Listen, listen," she laughed. "When we broke up, I thought well, fuck that. He won't be my husband. I wasted two years on the wrong guy. And then when I went back to look at that list, I realized the qualities I wanted were still the same but Cole barely had them." She crawled out of bed and walked to the closet. 

"Where are you going?" I asked, watching her. 

She grabbed a small jewelry box of hers, which I thought would have some earrings or something in them. But nope. It had a folded-up piece of paper. "This is that list. I found it when I was packing to move here. And when I read it then, after all those years, I realized that every single one of these boxes is checked off. By you." 

"What?" My eyes widened. 

She chuckled, walking back over and sitting beside me. "Read it." 

I unfolded it, scanning it quickly. Most of these traits were in me. Physical and personality traits too. "6'4, brown but messy hair, green eyes with specks of gold," I recited. This was very specific. "Why'd you put 'good at poker?'" I laughed. 

"A good poker player is attractive, I don't know," she shrugged. 

"Are you good at poker?" I asked, folding up the list and putting it in my nightstand drawer. 

"I'm fantastic at poker," she scoffed. 

"Let's play. I have chips in my study." 

"Let's play," she agreed, pulling on some sweatpants while I did the same and put a shirt on too. 

"The winner should get something." 

"That's so typical," she snorted. 

"Fine, let's switch it up. Let's just switch up the game." 

"How do you switch up poker?" she asked while I took her hand and we went into my study. 

I locked the door this time. I grabbed the box and opened it, both of us sitting at my desk. I sat in my chair and she sat directly across from me. 

"Answer me. How do you switch up poker?" she asked while taking the cards and shuffling them like she was a dealer. She's right. People that are good at poker are attractive. 

"You turn it into strip poker," I smirked. 

She chuckled, distributing our cards. "You want to play strip poker with me?" 

"Yes, ma'am." 

"All right, I'll bite. But it can't turn into anything else."

"Why not?" I opened the last drawer and pulled out the condom, setting it down in the center of the table. 

She stared at it and then looked up at me. "You didn't," she laughed. 

"After last time? You bet I did," I smirked, pulling out the first card.

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Chapter 42

I made this chapter a little longer because I've decided to make this the last chapter

:(((

I think everything is sorted, the chapter was fun, it was cute, etc, etc.

The next chapter will be the epilogue