BLUE BLOOD

58 | azalea vesper du sang

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He loved her more than she could ever know,

She loved him more than she could ever show.

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When I pushed into my dorm, I caught sight of Avery standing by my desk with the letters he wrote to me when we were children in his hands. My heart thundered. The letters.

He turned and when his silver eyes met mine, I saw the ache gleaming in them. The corner of lips curved to the most cynical smile I have ever seen. Those letters I so carelessly left on my desk were enough to confirm who I was.

Avery Dragomjr now knew who I was.

Who I truly was.

"Azalea," Avery finished the thought for me. "Azalea Vesper Du Sang."

I stood there, taking in the coldness seeping from ever tense muscle in his body. He vibrated with hurt. Avery looked at me as if I had stabbed a knife into his gut and then twisted it.

At his silence, I realized he was waiting. Waiting for confirmation.

For closure.

I could lie, I realized. I could lie about not being Azalea and he'd force himself to believe it because that hurt less than the truth. Still, at the rawness in his eyes, I found myself unable to.

I've lied to him about everything else. I just could not bring myself to lie about this. I hated myself for that because it was the rational, logical thing to do.

But I couldn't do that to him. I couldn't, even if my mind screamed at me to.

"I'm sorry." It was all I could offer him.

"Sorry," he repeated, before laughing humorlessly. "You just toss that word around."

"Avery-"

"Stop," Avery snapped, appearing as distant as he was when we first met. "How long have you known? How long have you know that I was the boy from the tunnels?"

"It was at the back of my head when I realized the other side of the island was owned by the Dragomirs," I swallowed, my throat tight and uncomfortable. "It finally occurred to me when I spoke to Helen one night and he told me that you loved a girl from the island."

Avery blinked and for a moment, his silver eyes were glassy. He looked so gutted as he confessed, softly, "At first, when I was with you, I thought you were Azalea. Then as I got to know you, all I felt was guilt. Do you understand? I didn't want to like you because you reminded me of her." A chuckle left his lips. "I guess it didn't matter. It doesn't matter anymore."

His words sliced at me more than I thought it would. This was it. I knew it when I peered into his eyes. There was only one thing Avery Dragomir hated more than cheaters and that was liars. I lied to him about some so personal, something I knew pained him for years.

No, I thought to myself. There was something else. Something else that I did that hurt him.

Avery shook his head. "This isn't about you disappearing when we were young. You lied to me. You lied to me when I kissed you and told you I wanted something real. You blamed me for lying to you again and again but you kept this from me."

"Don't you understand?" I said, feeling my eyes well up with tears. "I wasn't ever going to tell you I was Azalea."

This was why. He was so hurt because he realized that I never intended on telling him I was Azalea.

I always planned on disappearing after I accomplished everything I needed for Ella at Queens Erlington Academy.

"You weren't going to tell me until it was my turn to pay for Ella," Avery nodded, pulling up another sheet of paper left on my desk. My eyes latched to it and I saw that it was the list of names I was targeting, the list of names that were involved in Ella's death. Avery Dragomir was written at the very bottom. "Because you were never going to forgive me, were you?"

It was at that moment I knew I finally lost Avery Dragomir.

"You were never going to tell me," he said, when I didn't respond. "You were never going to tell me that you were the girl from the tunnels."

I didn't respond. I didn't need to. He could see the truth brimming from my entire being.

Avery's expression shuttered. Betrayal, pain, longing, and hurt flitted across his face before his face hardened and he became as unreadable as he was from our first conversation. My father's words from when I was in the hospital rang in my ears.

The Dragomir hates cheaters the most.

He kept secrets from me. He lied to me. I lied to him. But this, I knew he saw as the ultimate betrayal because Avery Dragomir loved Azalea Du Sang and could not understand why I did not want to accept his love.

He loved her so, so much but he has no idea if she ever reciprocated that. Now, Avery Dragomir will never believe that I loved him the way he did because only in this moment, did I fully understand my feelings for him. I didn't understand why he meant so much to me until now.

I closed my eyes for a moment. Clarity came to me.

I loved him.

I loved him, but it was too late. I realized too late.

How did it become like this?

I walked until I closed the distance between us. I wanted to pull him into me one last time but the damage was done. Instead, I reached for his hand. He let me, watching silently as I placed a single flash drive into his palm.

"Satin's confession," I told him, my eyes roaming across his face to remember all the smallest details as I did the nights we spent together. "She'll go to prison for what she did to your sister. You'll finally get what you always wanted."

Avery's hand gripped me as I pulled away but then he let it go after another moment of hesitation. Instead, he said, "I wrote it down. Everything."

"What?"

"What happened to Ella," Avery's silver eyes were unreadable as he handed me an envelope with the written confession he promised. "I wrote down everything that I witnessed. You'll finally get your truth."

I watched him walk towards the door, the boy who grew up with me during my worst times in the tunnels. Who made me laugh and solved puzzles with me. Who always loved me for me.

Then when we were older, he held me when I cried, even if he didn't know I was Azalea. He cared about me, more than I should I have cared for him. And what did I do? I used him and he let me, time and time again.

I trusted him and he kept secrets from me. I gave me his body and he let the blue bloods drug and kidnap me. He used me, he lied to me, and he abandoned me. Time and time again.

There were just too many lies between us and so little trust.

I stood there as he started to slip out of my fingers. I could say something. I could ask him to stay. That I forgive him and wanted him. But he deserved more than that. He deserved to marry a very sweet, lucky girl who could make him happy. I knew he deserved that so I kept quiet.

I deserved someone who I could trust wholeheartedly, too.

Yet when he stood in the doorway, I couldn't stop the last question from escaping my lips. I needed to know.

"Avery," I said, feeling parts of my heart ripping apart slowly. I promised myself I wouldn't cry in front of him but I felt like breaking down into heart-wrenching sobs. "What were you going to tell me?"

He paused. "That I loved you."

It was only when Avery Dragomir truly left me did I realize how much I loved him. But it cost me my heart and his love for me.

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