Obsession His Runaway Bride (Noelle and Adrian) novel Chapter 118

Chapter 118: Desperate

Chapter 118: Desperate

‘I’ve survived things people don’t clap for.

Not the kind of survival that gets headlines or standing ovations. The kind where you still get out of bed, even when your body feels like it’s carrying a hundred invisible pounds. Where you look in the mirror and see bruises…some on your skin, most on your spirit…but still manage to put on a face the world won’t question.

It’s strange, isn’t it? How good we become at hiding pain. How easy it is to say “I’m fine” when you’ve practiced it for years. You learn to smile on cue, to laugh at the right moment, to hold your tears until you’re alone… if they even come anymore. Sometimes the ache is too old for crying. Sometimes it’s just a quiet throb beneath your ribs that no one else can hear.

I’ve survived the kind of silence that doesn’t soothe. The kind that roars in your ears when everyone has left, and you’re sitting with the echo of all the things you couldn’t say. I’ve walked into rooms and felt the chill of judgment before anyone spoke. I’ve tasted the bitterness of love that only knew how to take. Love that called itself devotion but looked more like control. Love that chipped away at me piece by piece, until I didn’t know who I was without the pain.

There were nights I couldn’t sleep, not because I wasn’t tired, but because my mind wouldn’t stop replaying every word, every moment, every regret. And still…I woke up. I got dressed. I showed up for life even when I didn’t feel alive in it.

No one throws a party for that. No one hands you a medal for surviving your own mind.

But now… in this moment… I feel something unfamiliar but good. Peace. Not joy. Not relief. Just…

peace.

And it’s strange. After all the storms I’ve walked through, after all the betrayal I’ve inhaled like air, this stillness doesn’t feel like fear. It feels like rest. Like finally laying down the weight. Like giving myself permission to stop clenching my fists and holding my breath.

My body still hurts. The pain hasn’t left. The past is still mine. But right now, I’m not fighting it. I’m not running from it. I’m just… letting it be.

Maybe this is what it feels like to let go.

Not to forget. Not to forgive too soon. Just to loosen the grip. To stop bleeding for people who never bothered to ask where it hurt. To finally sit in the silence and feel it settle around me–not as a punishment, but as a balm.

After everything… I’m still here.

And maybe that’s enough.‘

A soft breath escaped Grace’s lips as she stepped to the very edge of the sidewalk. The bridge unfurled ahead of her like an altar beneath the pale city moonlight. The river shimmered below her like a sheet of molten silver catching the sky’s bruised reflection–still and endless.

1/3

Chapter 118: Desperate

+25 BONUS

She closed her eyes, letting the wind kiss her face like a ghost from a past life.

It felt like a memory she hadn’t lived yet.

Maybe this was it.

Maybe she was finally going to see Faith again.

Faith, who had deserved more.

‘Maybe I’ll get to hold her hand again,‘ she thought as she inhaled deeply and released it like a surrender.

“I… am free,” she whispered.

And for a single, fragile heartbeat, she believed it.

But then

“Grace! Stop! Don’t move! Please!”

Marco’s voice shattered the silence like a bullet through glass.

Grace didn’t flinch. She just blinked slowly, almost lazily, and turned to look over her shoulder. He was there–panting, ragged and his eyes were wide with panic at the sight of her teetering on the edge.

But then she turned to face him fully as her silhouette was drawn against the wind. Her feet remained at the edge of the curb, a breath away from the guardrail. The cold pressed into her like an old friend, tightening her bloodied clothes to her skin. The wound at her side had soaked through, darker, wet, and warm in contrast to the wind’s bite.

“I begged you once,” she suddenly said ever so softly. “I stood in front of you with my heart in my hands, hoping you’d choose me.”

“But instead…” her voice wavered, but her stance never did, “you looked at me like I was dirt. And when I stopped begging…when I finally turned away…you gave me a bullet.”

She let out a dry, bitter laugh while er lips trembled but no tears came.

“One hell of a rejection, huh?” She joked while barely swaying backwards,

The world around her began to blur and tilt. Her legs were weakened beneath her as the pain surged, pulsing through her in waves that stole breath and thought alike.

“Grace,” Marco called again, softer now as his voice began to break. “Please…”

But his begging only urged her to climb onto the guardrail which made him instantly stop.

The wind howled louder, wrapping around her like visible arms as if it couldn’t decide whether to hold her or let her go.

“I’m tired…” she murmured. “So tired.”

2/3

Chapter 118: Desperate

+25 BONUS

Her eyes fluttered shut for a moment.

“Dr. Everett would lose his mind if he saw me like this,” Grace murmured as a breathless laugh slipped past her lips, too fragile to echo. She glanced down at herself–at the blood blooming across her side like a cruel flower, at her torn coat flapping against her frame, soaked and ruined. Her fingers twitched slightly as they brushed over the wound, coming away darker than before.

“He always tells me to rest,” she continued. “Maybe I’ll finally listen.”

Marco took a sharp breath. His body moved before he thought while inching forward with hands rising in surrender as if approaching a frightened creature.

“Grace…” he spoke with trembling voice. “I’m sorry. I’ll fix this–I’ll patch you up, I swear. Just come here. Walk to me. Don’t look back. Please… let me save you.”

But she only lifted her chin and when she looked at him, her eyes were hollowed by pain, dulled by truths too long ignored. She didn’t see a man with outstretched hands, wanting to save her. She saw a boy who had watched her burn until she was ashes. And the thought made her scoff.

“Save me? Marco… I’m not a damsel in distress.”

The corners of her lips twitched into a faint smile as her eyelids began to feel heavy.

“I don’t need a man to save me. I already saved myself.”

And with that, her eyes fluttered shut—just as a gun was fired and a desperate voice came screaming her name.