Chapter 2 The Handsome Stranger

Renée watched him go, her vision blurred by tears that refused to stop. She raised a trembling hand, trying to push the disheveled strands of hair away from her tear-stained face, but it was a futile effort. The tears continued to stream down her cheeks.

The man she had loved, the man she had devoted everything to, had betrayed and rejected her in the most brutal way imaginable. Her heart felt like it had been ripped from her chest and shattered into a million pieces, the pain of it all leaving her numb and speechless. The future she had once envisioned with him lay in ruins, replaced by a deep, gnawing sense of loss and despair.

Renée slowly stood up from the cold, hard ground, her legs trembling beneath her. She turned to look at the house one last time, the place that had been her home.

It had been a gift from her godfather at the orphanage, a man who had seen something in her worth protecting, worth giving a home to. And now, through her own naivety and misplaced trust, she had signed it all away. How could she have been so foolish, so blind to the deception that had been unfolding right under her nose?

Renée had nowhere to go. That house had been her only refuge, her only sense of stability. Without it, she was lost. She had no stable job, no savings to fall back on. Her position at work was still precarious, not yet a full-time role that could offer her any real security. The realization that she was utterly alone, with nothing to her name, hit her like a wave of despair.

With heavy steps, Renée began to walk away from the only home she had ever known. Everything felt so dark in that moment to her. She didn't know where she was going, but there was one place that called to her in her sorrow-the bar. It was the only place she could think of, the only place where she could drown her pain, even if just for a little while.

Ordering three bottles of alcohol, she finished them soon. However, the pain in her heart was unbearable, and no amount of alcohol seemed to dull it. She took another swig, hoping to drown the sorrow that threatened to suffocate her. But the ache persisted.

Her stubborn tears continued to flow. She wiped them away with the back of her hand, but they only kept coming.

As she stared at the empty bottle in her hand, a wild thought crossed her mind. She imagined smashing the bottle against Shawn's head, imagining the shattering glass as some kind of release for all the pent-up rage inside her.

The thought brought a twisted satisfaction, a fleeting fantasy of vengeance that she knew she could never carry out. But for a brief moment, it felt good to imagine.

Gripping the bottle tightly, Renée stood up, her movements unsteady as she dragged her feet toward the exit. The world around her was a blur of colors and sounds, everything muffled by the fog of alcohol and grief. She barely noticed where she was going, her only focus on putting one foot in front of the other.

Suddenly, her head collided with something solid, stopping her in her tracks. The impact jolted her slightly, and she instinctively looked up, her dazed mind trying to process what had just happened.

When her eyes met his, the world seemed to come into sharp focus. Renée's breath caught in her throat as she found herself staring into the ocean-blue eyes of the man standing before her.

For a moment, everything else faded away-the pain, the heartbreak, the alcohol-induced haze-replaced by the sheer intensity of his gaze. His eyes were like the depths of the ocean, deep and mesmerizing, pulling her in without warning.

"My boyfriend cheated on me with my best friend," she confessed to the stranger. She didn't know why she was telling this to a man she had never met before, but in that moment, it didn't seem to matter. She needed to say it out loud, to make it real, to make sense of the chaos in her heart.

As if the absurdity of her situation had suddenly hit her, Renée began to laugh-a wild, desperate sound that quickly dissolved into sobs. Her laughter echoed through the lounge, drawing a few curious glances from nearby patrons, but most of them quickly looked away.

The man before her seemed unfazed by her outburst, his expression remaining unreadable. He brushed past her, intent on leaving, when Renée, driven by a sudden surge of desperation, reached out and grabbed the edge of his sleeve.

"I want revenge on him," she blurted out.

He stopped, turning back to look at her, his ocean-blue eyes meeting hers once again. Before he could tell her to let go, Renée's body betrayed her. Her head lolled forward, crashing into his chest as her legs gave way beneath her.

The bottle she had been holding slipped from her fingers, shattering on the floor with a sharp sound.

"Shawn is evil," she murmured weakly, her words barely audible. "I want to destroy him." And then, before she could say anything more, the darkness closed in, and she fainted, her consciousness slipping away as she fell into the arms of the handsome stranger.

The man caught her easily, his arms wrapping around her to keep her from hitting the floor.