My Montana Escape: A New Beginning

The cool metal of the gurney is the last thing I'll remember. One more session, the doctor said, and the past ten years of my life will be wiped clean.

It all comes back to that night. I walked in to find my fiancé, Alex, kissing my half-sister, Kalie-the girl I raised since she was fifteen.

When I confronted them, Kalie shoved me. I hit my head on a steel model, bleeding on the floor of the studio we designed together. But Alex didn't rush to me. He rushed to comfort her.

She lied, painting me as the attacker. My best friend, my entire world, turned against me. Alex, my Alex, had me committed, signing the papers that subjected me to brutal, punitive electroshock treatments.

He wasn't just erasing my memory; he was erasing me, punishing me for a crime I didn't commit, all to protect her.

Now, waking from the final, consensual treatment, I find a note I left for myself. It's a plan. Sell the firm. Sell the house. Disappear to Montana. And this time, I won't just be erasing the memories. I'll be erasing them.

Chapter 1

Amelie POV:

They are about to erase you, Alex.

The cool metal of the gurney against my back is a stark reminder of the finality of this decision. One more session, the doctor had said. One more, and the past ten years of my life, the life I built with you, will become a blank page.

The clinical scent of antiseptic fills my lungs, a smell I' ve come to associate with a strange kind of peace. It' s the smell of a clean slate. A brutal, medically induced one.

A nurse with kind eyes checks the IV in my arm. "You ready, Amelie?"

I nod, my throat too tight to speak.

She gives my hand a gentle squeeze. "He' s not here yet?"

I don' t have to ask who "he" is. Alex. My fiancé. My business partner. The man whose memory I' m about to obliterate. He was supposed to be here. He promised.

A hollow ache settles in my chest, a familiar guest these past few months. Of course he' s not here. He' s probably with her.

The anesthetic begins to drip into my veins, a cold trail that snakes up my arm. My eyelids grow heavy, the stark white of the ceiling blurring into a soft haze. As the world dissolves, the memories I' m so desperate to escape surge forward one last time, vivid and cruel.

It all comes back to that night. The night my perfect life shattered like glass.

It was the tenth anniversary of the day we founded our architecture firm, Hamilton & Martin. Ten years of late nights, shared dreams, and blueprints that became towering realities. Ten years of being his partner in every sense of the word. I had planned a surprise.

I' d spent the afternoon baking his favorite carrot cake, the scent of cinnamon and warm sugar filling the minimalist home we' d designed together. Our home. A testament to our shared vision, all clean lines and expansive windows overlooking the city lights.

I carried the cake toward my studio, the small, private space at the back of the house where I did my best work. I was going to surprise him, to celebrate just the two of us before our big party the next day.

But the low, breathy laugh I heard wasn' t mine.

I froze in the doorway, my heart stopping.

Alex.

His back was to me, but I knew that posture, the way his shoulders relaxed when he was truly at ease. He was leaning against my drafting table, the one where I' d sketched out our future.

And then I saw her.

Kalie. My half-sister. The bubbly, charming ray of sunshine I had raised since she was fifteen.

She was pressed against him, her arms wrapped around his neck, her face tilted up to his. His hands were tangled in her blonde hair, pulling her closer for a kiss that was anything but innocent. It was hungry, desperate. The kind of kiss he hadn' t given me in years.

The box slipped from my numb fingers. It hit the polished concrete floor with a soft, sickening thud.

The sound made them spring apart. Alex spun around, his eyes wide with a panic that quickly curdled into something else when he saw me. Kalie just looked flushed and triumphant, a small, knowing smirk playing on her lips.

A wave of nausea washed over me. The two people I loved most in the world. The man I was going to marry, and the sister I had sacrificed my youth to protect.

My hand moved before I could think. The crack of my palm against Alex' s cheek echoed in the sudden, suffocating silence of the studio. It was a sharp, clean sound. The sound of a final break.

He stared at me, his hand flying to his cheek, shock turning to anger in his eyes.

But before he could speak, Kalie lunged forward. "Don' t you hurt him!" she shrieked, and shoved me. Hard.

I stumbled backward, my balance gone. My head connected with the sharp steel corner of a skyscraper model on a nearby pedestal. A searing pain exploded behind my eyes, and the world tilted violently. I slid to the floor, the smell of crushed carrot cake and betrayal filling my senses.

Through a haze of pain, I saw Alex rush forward. But he didn' t rush to me. He rushed to Kalie, pulling her into his arms as she burst into dramatic, heaving sobs.

"Shh, it' s okay, it' s okay," he murmured, stroking her hair. "She didn' t mean it."

She didn' t mean it?

I lay on the floor, my head throbbing, a cold wetness starting to seep into my hair, and I realized a devastating truth. This wasn' t the first time. The ease of their embrace, the practiced way she melted into him, the way he comforted her first-this was a well-worn path.

Kalie was the sun, a dazzling, effortless star who drew everyone into her orbit. I was the shadow she cast.

Growing up, our mother, bitter from a messy divorce with my father, had always reminded me of my place. "You' re just like him, Amelie. Cold. Unfeeling." While Kalie, the daughter of my father' s second wife, was the golden child, the one who could do no wrong.

I was the responsible one, the quiet one, the one who expressed love through loyalty and action, not flowery words. I was the moon, reflecting light. Kalie was the sun itself.

And I was just a shadow. An afterthought.

When our father died, I was twenty-two, just starting my career. Kalie was a grieving, lost fifteen-year-old. The responsibility fell to me. I became her legal guardian. I put my life on hold to give her a stable one.

I always had a sense of unease, a feeling that Kalie' s presence in our home was a ticking clock. She' d always been envious, always believed she deserved everything I had-my success, my stability, and most of all, Alex.

I had told myself it was just sibling rivalry. I had told myself that the decade Alex and I had built together was stronger than her youthful infatuation.

I was a fool.

The sight of them together, in my sanctuary, didn' t just break my heart. It broke my reality.

Alex finally seemed to remember I was there, bleeding on the floor. He knelt beside me, his face a mask of concern that felt utterly false. "Amelie? God, are you okay?"

His hand reached for my face, and the touch that had once been my greatest comfort now felt like a brand.

"Don' t touch me," I rasped, my voice raw.

He flinched back, a flicker of guilt in his eyes before it was replaced by defensiveness. "It' s not what you think."

The classic, pathetic excuse.

"It never is," I said, the words tasting like acid.

"Look, we can talk about this," he said, his voice low and urgent. "But you have to understand. You' ve been so distant lately, so wrapped up in work. It' s like you' re not even here half the time."

Gaslighting. The blame shifted from his infidelity to my emotional inadequacy. He was punishing me for being the steady, reliable architect of our lives while he craved the fleeting thrill of a wrecking ball.

"And Kalie... she' s just a kid, Amelie. She' s been going through a lot. She looks up to me."

A bitter, humorless laugh escaped my lips. I could feel the blood, warm and sticky, matting my hair. "A kid? She' s twenty-two, Alex. And she' s my sister."

My words hung in the air, sharp and accusatory. I saw him wince. He knew. He knew exactly what he had done.

"You mean your half-sister," he corrected, his voice hardening. As if that lessened the betrayal. As if that erased the years I had spent raising her.

He was already defending her. He was already choosing her.

He ran a hand through his hair, the picture of a man burdened by the emotions of two women. "Amelie, just... calm down. We' ll figure this out."

I pushed myself up, my vision swimming. My hand came away from my head stained red. I stared at it, then back at him. "There' s nothing to figure out."

I turned my back on him, on the ruins of my studio, and took a shaky step toward the door. I needed to get out. I needed to breathe air that wasn' t thick with their lies.

He grabbed my arm. "Where are you going? You' re hurt. We need to get you to a hospital."

I flinched away from his touch as if it were fire. "Let go of me."

His grip tightened. "Amelie, stop being so dramatic!" he hissed, his charm vanishing to reveal the weakness underneath. "It was a mistake. A stupid mistake. That' s all."

A knock on the open studio door made us both turn. It was Bailey, my best friend, her face painted with concern. She had arrived early for the party.

"What' s going on?" she asked, her eyes darting between my bleeding head, Alex' s red cheek, and Kalie, who was still artfully sobbing in the corner. "Oh my god, Amelie, what happened to you?"

From behind Alex, Kalie' s voice, thick with manufactured tears, drifted across the room. "It was my fault. I... I was just talking to Alex, and Amelie misunderstood. She got so angry... she pushed me, and then she slipped."

My world, already tilting, spun completely off its axis. The lie was so blatant, so audacious, it left me breathless.

Alex didn' t correct her. He just stood there, his silence a deafening confirmation.

Bailey' s concerned gaze shifted, hardening with judgment as it landed on me. She saw a hysterical, injured woman and a weeping, "innocent" girl. She saw the scene Kalie had painted.

And in that instant, I was utterly, completely alone.

The doctor' s voice pulled me from the memory, a distant echo. "We' re starting now, Amelie."

A tear I didn' t know I was holding slipped from the corner of my eye and traced a cold path down my temple.

Good.

Erase him.

Erase her.

Erase it all.

The last thing I saw before the darkness took me completely was the empty doorway where Alex was supposed to be.