Crashing into His Vengeance Chapter 07
One week after the wedding, the news arrived: Julian had severed his spine in a racing crash. He was fully paralyzed.
A surviving driver from the underground circuit said Julian looked like he’d seen a ghost. He had screamed “Lizzie” at the empty passenger seat before violently jerking the steering wheel.
That modified beast of a car slammed into a concrete
vall like a missile.
But he didn’t die. Perhaps that was the cruelest punishment of all.
I received the call that afternoon.
It was sent by the mechanic from his former racing team, one of the few individuals with whom he had
forged a close rapport.
“I know I shouldn’t be bothering you. But… the doctors say his survival rate is high, yet he has no will to live.”
“He’s refusing food, refusing treatment.”
“He won’t see anyone. He just lies there, starving, begging to see you one last time. He keeps screaming your name.”
“I know he’s scum. I know he wronged you. But as his friend, I can’t watch him rot like this. Could you just come? Even if it’s just for a glance.”
“Okay.”
I agreed.
Not out of softness. Not out of some misplaced saintly compassion.
I just felt that after reading a long, terrible book, I needed to personally close the back cover before I could truly start a new chapter.
Pushing open the door to the ward, I saw the man who had wasted five years of my youth.
He was lying there, a broken doll hooked up to machines. Those hands that once gripped the steering
wheel to control his destiny now dangled uselessly against the sheets.
When he saw me, his dead, ash–gray eyes suddenly erupted with a terrifying, terminal brightness.
“Lizzie…”
“You finally came… I knew you wouldn’t abandon me.
Julian tried to prop himself up, but the agony twisted his face into a grotesque mask, and he collapsed back
onto the pillow.
Tears slid from the corners of his eyes.
“Karma… this is all karma.”
He wept, his gaze hooking into me, trying to drag out even a shred of pity from the depths of my heart.
“God is punishing me for how I treated you. Lizzie, I have nothing now. No racing, no fame, no legs… even
the mother I thought loved me was a lie.”
“I only have you now. You are the only person in this world who ever truly loved me. Please, don’t leave me… I’ll spend the rest of my life atoning. I’ll be your dog if I have to, just don’t let me rot here alone.”
If this were the Lizzie from six months ago, I would have already been drowning in tears, rushing to hug him.
But now?
walked to the bedside and looked down at him.
“Before, you acted out deep affection with flowers and sweet nothings. Now, you’re acting out repentance with paralysis ånd tears. Do you really think this is atonement?”
You went racing because you couldn’t accept losing. You wanted to win back your ego, not my love. You
crippled yourself because of your own incompetence.
It has nothing to do with me.”
“You don’t love me. You don’t love Alexandra. You don’t even love that imaginary, suffering mother of yours. Julian, from beginning to end, the only person you have ever loved is yourself.”
I leaned down, staring into his eyes.
“Looking at you now, I don’t feel the thrill of revenge. I don’t feel a shred of sympathy, either.”
“Between us, there is nothing left but disgust.”
I straightened up, taking one last look at the man who had once occupied my entire life.
“Let’s never meet again.”
I turned toward the door.
“Lizzie-!”
A desperate, shrill scream tore from his throat behind me.
I didn’t look back. I pushed the door open and walked out.
At 3:00 AM that night.
My phone vibrated.
It was a text from a strange number. Just one line:
[You were right. A filthy person like me doesn’t
deserve the light. This is the last thing I can do for you -disappear completely.]
Moments later, the news came from the hospital.
Julian had pulled out his oxygen and IV tubes in the dead of night.
By the time the nurse found him, his body was already cold.
In extreme pain, regret, and solitude, he had ended his absurd life.
When I heard the news, I paused.
Did I feel anything?
Maybe a little. But it was the same feeling you get when you see a withered tree by the roadside or a bird
that flew into a window. Nothing more.
The next day, Julian’s attorney found me.
He was insolvent, buried in debt. His only remaining asset was the house we had lived in for five years.
In his will, he left it to me.
“Sell it.”
I didn’t hesitate for a second.
“Donate all the proceeds anonymously to the ‘Aid for Victims of Domestic Violence‘ foundation.”
I didn’t need that house to remember anything.
Every brick, every tile in that place was soaked in lies.
The moment I signed that document, everything related to Julian finally turned to ash.
Two years later.
Vienna, The Golden Hall.
The applause washed over me like a tidal wave.
I stood up from the Steinway. The stage lights hit my gown, refracting into blinding sparks.
For two years, with Chris by my side, I used music to
epair the cracks in my soul. I had found her again- the proud, confident, shining Elizabeth Whitmore.
No longer an accessory. No longer a tool for revenge.
I was just me.
The performance ended, and the crowd dispersed.
I returned to the empty stage, wanting to feel the lingering vibration one last time.
Footsteps approached from behind.
I turned to see Chris holding a velvet box.
He walked up to me and slowly dropped to one knee.
This time, it wasn’t a contract for a family alliance.
It wasn’t a “pact” to help me escape a demon.
And he wasn’t the “doctor” fixing my broken heart.
“Lizzie.”
“For two years, I’ve watched you rebuild your world, brick by brick. I’ve watched you shine brighter than you ever have before.”
Chris opened the box. Inside was a diamond ring- simple, piercingly bright.
“Now, I want to ask you to let me be not just your guardian, but your lover. Not out of responsibility, but because… I love you. From the beginning until now, that has never changed.”
“Elizabeth Whitmore, will you let me walk the rest of the road with you?”
I looked at him.
The man who had silently walked behind me for years, cleaning up my messes.
I thought of every midnight for the past two years when I woke up from nightmares, finding him guarding me.
My eyes felt hot.
Outside the window, the sun pierced through the glass, sweeping away the last of the gloom.
I had finally walked out of that endless rainy season.
Smiling, I reached out my hand.
“I will, Chris.”
THE END