He lied to me again. And this time, my heart just shut down. I didn't love him anymore.

1.

The king-sized bed in the hotel room.

I was still basking in the afterglow of Ryder's touch when his voice, husky with post-intimacy breathlessness, whispered a promise in my ear.

"Stella, just give me one more month. Next month, I'll propose."

"Stella, I, Ryder Sterling, swear I'll give you the most magnificent wedding, make you the most envied bride in the world."

This was the seventh year of our secret relationship.

No one in all of Veridian City would ever believe that the notoriously aloof heir of the Sterling family and the infamous adopted daughter of the Reed family had been…