Chapter 2

The moment the words left my mouth, Jared Shaw and Ivy Pruitt both froze.

And it wasn't hard to see why they were angry.

In our town, there was one rule everyone knew.

Whoever called off an engagement had to kneel in front of the whole town, let the other party take a switch to them, and then walk around the town for half a month with the marks still fresh.

That, in fact, was the very reason Jared had never dared to break the engagement. The thought hit him, and the smug look on his face went dark at once. Still, twenty-odd years of living side by side had given him a kind of nerve.

"Debbie Morton, are you out of your mind?"

"That engagement was made by word of mouth, so it can be called off by word of mouth. No rules to follow."

Ivy nodded along at every word.

Then she reached out and took my hand, playing at closeness.

"Cousin, I know you want to marry Jared, but love is free, and so is marriage."

"I didn't want to hide it from you, but Jared and I already went and got our marriage license. If you insist on refusing the breakup, then you'll be the third party wrecking our marriage."

"Cousin, you're so remarkable anyway. Just let Jared go to me, all right?"

"And I'm not afraid to tell you either. Jared's going to make something of himself. Don't make trouble for him just to feel good for a moment, don't get on his bad side!"

"Give us your blessing, and we'll always remember how good you were to us."

I glanced at Jared.

He gave a cold snort and nodded, as if agreeing with everything Ivy said.

It struck me as absurd.

I'd poured over twenty years of my youth into helping him become a rich man, and he couldn't remember a single bit of that kindness. How could one act of stepping aside be anything he'd ever remember?

Besides, I wasn't the twenty-year-old me anymore.

What I wanted wasn't for him to remember me kindly. I wanted his tears. I wanted him to pay for what he'd done.

So I shook Ivy's hand off and spoke, cold.

"Jared Shaw, you keep saying ours was only a verbal engagement."

"Then let me ask you. Who bought your SAT prep books? Who paid and worked to nurse your parents when they were sick?"

"When you were taking things and money from my family, why didn't you say it was only a verbal engagement then? Why were you crying and shouting that we were engaged, that our two families were one?"

At that point.

I let out another cold laugh.

"If I hadn't done all that for you as your fiancée, where would you have found the leisure to go falling in love with Ivy?"

I wasn't exaggerating.

So the onlookers around us all took my side, pointing at the two of them, and here and there you could catch the words tramp and shameless.

Mom and Dad had always respected me, so once the anger passed they came around too.

"Debbie's right."

"If you want to break the engagement, then you'll do it by the rules for breaking an engagement!"

"And it's not just the engagement. From now on, we don't claim Ivy Pruitt as family either."

Ivy burst into tears on the spot.

Jared had been angry to begin with, and the sight of Ivy crying only made him more frantic.

"I already said it, marriage is free, so is breaking one off. You can't refuse me, you can't make these demands. There's no law that says any of this."

I gave another few cold laughs.

"There's nothing unfree about it. If you'd come and asked me to break it off properly, I might not have said a word about any rules."

"But you didn't ask properly. You showed up at my door waving a marriage license, calling me a woman throwing herself at you. I'm a person too. Why shouldn't I be angry?"

"If it were me today, showing up at your house with some man and a marriage license, making a scene and cursing at you, would you just casually agree to break it off?"