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Back in my New York apartment, the city lights felt cold, indifferent.
The silence was a heavy blanket.
I sank onto my sofa, the plush velvet doing nothing to cushion the fall.
Hours later, Noah found me there.
His face was pale, his eyes red-rimmed. Guilt radiated off him in waves.
"Liv, I... I am so, so sorry."
He sat beside me, his hands twisting in his lap.
"I never knew he told you... I mean, I never knew he let you believe he was the one from the accident. He always just... he let everyone think he was a good guy."
I said nothing. There were no words.
"He's always been obsessed with Sophia," Noah continued, his voice low. "Since the day he met her. It was... unhealthy. Everyone saw it but him. Or her. She loved it."
He paused, then reached into his bag.
"Liam asked me to give this to you. Before he left for Oxford. He got in, you know. His doctoral program."
Liam Peterson. The actual hero.
Noah handed me a carefully wrapped book.
I unwrapped it slowly. A rare first-edition astronomy text.
"Cosmos" by Carl Sagan.
Inside the front cover, a note in neat, precise handwriting.
"For the brightest star I know. Hope to see you shine even brighter. – Liam."
A small, dry sob escaped me.
The brightest star.
My deep-seated gratitude, the admiration I'd felt for my supposed savior, the respect that formed the bedrock of my pursuit of Ethan... it was all meant for Liam.
Liam, who was kind, and brilliant, and who had actually saved my life without ever seeking a word of thanks.
He'd just quietly given me a thoughtful gift and wished me well.
While Ethan... Ethan had stolen another man's heroism and used it to bind me to him.
A new resolve began to harden within the shattered pieces of my heart.
Hayes Construction had been planning a European expansion for years. London was the first target office.
Close to Oxford.
Close to Liam.
I wouldn't chase him. Not like I'd chased Ethan.
But I needed to be near someone genuine. Someone who represented truth, not deceit.
And maybe, just maybe, I needed to thank him properly.
I stood up, my legs a little shaky but firm.
"Noah," I said, my voice raspy but clear. "Book me a one-way ticket to London. First class."
He looked up, surprised. "Liv, are you sure?"
"Yes." I looked at the book in my hands. "It's time for Hayes Construction to conquer Europe. And it's time for me to find out what shining brighter actually feels like."
A few days later, my phone buzzed. Ethan.
The name sent a fresh wave of nausea through me.
I let it go to voicemail.
His message was infuriatingly casual.
"Hey, Liv. Sorry about missing your calls the other night. Things got crazy. Sophia's fine, by the way. Anyway, I was thinking, we never got to celebrate our anniversary. Dinner tonight? My treat. Call me."
Oblivious. Utterly, pathologically oblivious.
Or maybe he just didn't care that I might have found out.
He probably assumed Noah wouldn't dare tell me the whole truth.
He underestimated my brother's loyalty to me. He underestimated me.
I deleted the voicemail without a second thought.
My assistant was already finalizing the London office lease. My New York apartment was being packed.
I was moving on, and Ethan Vance was rapidly becoming a footnote in a chapter I was determined to close.
I picked up Liam's book again, tracing the title with my finger.
"Cosmos."
A whole universe of possibilities waited.
And for the first time in three years, I felt a flicker of something that wasn't tied to Ethan.
It felt like hope.