Chapter 1 - The Roses Hit the Floor
Landon had imagined Camille’s reaction to the roses several times on the drive over.
He had not imagined finding her standing with Travis.
The restaurant was one of the few places Camille still described as “theirs”—golden light, white tablecloths, crystal glasses catching reflections from the chandeliers. Landon entered slowly in his wheelchair, a bouquet of red roses resting across his lap.
He had come without warning.
That had seemed romantic twenty minutes earlier.
Now it felt like a mistake.
Camille stood near a corner table, close enough to Travis that no explanation could make the scene innocent. Travis’s hand rested at the small of her back. Camille was smiling in the relaxed, intimate way Landon had not seen directed at him in months.
Then she noticed him.
Her smile disappeared.
For half a second, she looked frightened.
Then contempt replaced it.
She walked straight toward him.
Landon looked from Camille to Travis and felt something inside him collapse more quietly than any table ever could.
“Camille?”
She looked down at the wheelchair.
Not at his face.
“A cripple like you isn’t worthy of me!”
The words seemed to stop the entire restaurant.
She snatched the bouquet from his lap and hurled it directly into him.
Roses struck his chest and face before scattering across the polished floor.
Then Camille deliberately stepped on them.
Once.
Twice.
Red petals crushed beneath her black heels.
Nora immediately moved between them.
“That’s enough.”
Camille turned and slapped her hard across the face.
SLAP!
Nora staggered sideways and fell into a nearby chair.
Landon’s hands closed around his wheelchair armrests.
For months, Camille had watched him try to stand.
Watched him fail.
Watched him collapse back into this chair while whispering that perhaps he needed to accept reality.
But she did not know what had happened during the last two weeks.
She did not know what Nora knew.
And she definitely did not know what Landon had stopped drinking.
Landon pushed down against the armrests.
His legs trembled immediately.
Pain shot through his thighs.
He rose anyway.
Slowly.
Unsteadily.
But fully.
Camille froze.
Travis stared as if he had seen something impossible.
Landon stood in front of his wheelchair.
Travis recovered first.
His face hardened.
He lunged and threw a punch.
Landon shifted enough to avoid it and drove one powerful retaliatory blow into Travis’s torso.
THUD!
Travis flew backward into a nearby dining table.
CRASH!
The table collapsed beneath him.
Plates shattered. Crystal rolled across the floor. Travis landed amid the wreckage, stunned.
Landon remained standing.
Barely.
But standing.
He moved directly in front of Camille.
Then he took out his phone.
The footage filled the screen.
Camille appeared inside Landon’s own bedroom suite.
Landon himself was visible asleep nearby.
On the video, Camille looked over her shoulder, opened something concealed in her hand, and slipped something into the drink waiting beside Landon’s chair.
Then she stirred it.
Camille stopped breathing.
Landon held the phone steady despite the shaking in his arm.
“Did you think I didn’t know what you put in my drink?”
Her face went completely pale.
And for the first time, Landon realized her fear was not about being caught cheating.
May you like
It was about him standing.
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