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"Weren’t you just there for the wedding?" Whitney widened her eyes beneath her perfect e’s mind strove furiously for an explanation The sa But that voice inside her was louder now

You don’t have to do this anye stood taller, her shoulders straighter "Why I went there isn’t your business"

Instead of unleashing her wrath, Whitney smiled as if she’d just reeled in a fish who hadn’t put up ht "But it is my business why you ith my husband, isn’t it?" She batted her thick, false eyelashes

Whitney paused Waited for Paige to understand her true

Like an ice pick to the heart, the realization hit Paige that her sister ood while later, she’d watched Evan leave, his clothes hastily donned, his hair a e’s was Whitney had seen everything, from the suitcase tipped sideways, to the jacket, to the bowl in therooe and Evan needed, for Whitney to plunk herself down right in the middle of as already such a co hie "Aren’t you, you dirty little slut?"

Paige’s fierce response was instinctive "Don’t call ht have stepped aside to let her sister in…but her heart refused to do the sa She’d never listened to anyone

"How could you betray littered in Whitney’s eyes On anyone else, Paige ht the tears were real, but she knew her sister too well The tears were designed to uilt as Whitney injected a pathetic wobble into her voice "I’ve needed you so badly since he left e’s face, all pretense of tears vanishing "But you Weren’t There" She punctuated every ith fury "Instead, you were off screwing my husband" Venom smeared every syllable "What would Mom think of that after you proe with her worst "But you let Daddy die And now you’ve stolen Evan fro Her sister was a ht button to e knew

Yet the accusations still cut her to ribbons Her heart felt raw and bleeding, flayed open as if Whitney had the skill of Jack the Ripper

Paige had failed her mother She’d failed her father She’d even failed Evan, because she’d never told hiance and lies

But her parents were dead Evan wasn’t He deserved another chance at happiness

And--goddae deserved to be happy too

Nine years had been way too long to wait for Evan But thirty years had been an absolute eternity of being Whitney’s emotional slave That story she’d told Evan about the rope swing had been one tiny glie wouldn’t let onethe role of protector that her iven her Just as Evan had to deal with the bad choices his e with her own mother