Forced To Marry My Cousin's Fiancé

Chapter 64: Chapter 64

Ethan pulled out his phone to call Lane’s father when the security guard at the gate refused to let him in. He was there to get his wife. He had originally let her go back to her parents’ place to give her some space to think, but it looked like she had other plans. It seemed like the only thing on her mind was walking away from him for good.

As he told the lawyer who had served him those signed divorce papers, he was never going to sign them.

Lane was his wife, and she was going to stay that way. If they had forced him to marry her before, he would force her to stay now. Not to make her miserable but so he could finally make her happy. He was dead set on making up for his mistakes and all the times he’d shut her out because of his own blind anger.

It took a while for Richard to finally pick up the phone. "Uncle," Ethan said as soon as the line connected.

"What do you want, Ethan?" Richard asked, his voice cold as ice.

Ethan took a deep breath. "I’m outside. The guard won’t let me in. I’m here to pick up my wife."

He heard Richard let out a heavy sigh on the other end. "You know what, Ethan? I didn’t agree to that marriage because I wanted to latch onto your family name."

Ethan gritted his teeth as the older man continued.

"I agreed to it because I didn’t want my grandchild to be born without a father. I wanted a complete family for my grandkid so nobody could talk trash about my daughter being pregnant and alone. I thought it was the right call, but it turned out to be the worst mistake of my life. I watched my daughter break. I saw her sob in front of us, begging us to support her in leaving you."

Hearing that felt like a massive hand was crushing Ethan’s chest, making it hard to draw a breath.

"This time, I’m standing by her," Richard added. "I’m putting her feelings first. Just accept her wishes, Ethan. Sign those papers and go focus on your ’true love’ and that other kid. I’ll take care of my daughter and my grandchild."

Ethan shook his head even though Richard couldn’t see him. There was no way he was letting this happen.

"Can I just... can I talk to her? Please?" He needed to tell her how he felt, hoping he could still change her mind.

"It’s too late, Ethan."

A sudden wave of fear washed over him. "What do you mean by that?"

"Lane’s gone," Richard told him.

Ethan’s heart started thumping against his ribs. "Gone where? Where did she go?"

"I don’t know. She just said she wanted to get away from you. And even if I did know, I wouldn’t tell you. My daughter doesn’t deserve to be hurt anymore. She deserves to be happy."

Every word felt like a dagger twisting in Ethan’s heart. Before he could even get another word out, Richard hung up on him.

Since he couldn’t get any answers from her parents, Ethan headed over to see her friends. He was positive they knew where she was hiding. He decided to try Ava first because he knew Lane’s other friend, Noah, wouldn’t tell him a damn thing.

Ethan knew Noah had a thing for Lane. He’d clocked it the first time he saw the guy. There was just something in the way he looked at her. As a man, Ethan knew the difference between a "just friends" look and the look of someone in love.

He took a deep breath as he reached Ava’s condo and pressed the doorbell. After a few moments, the door swung open. Ava’s face immediately soured when she saw him.

"What are you doing here?" she asked, her voice dripping with attitude.

"I need to know where Lane is," he said.

Ava raised an eyebrow. "And why exactly are you looking for her?"

"I need to talk to her."

"She’s not here. And even if she were, do you really think I’d let you near her?" Ava snapped.

"Where is she, Ava?" Ethan asked, trying to stay focused.

"Do you honestly think I’m going to tell you?" she asked sarcastically.

He let out a long sigh. "Please, Ava. I’m begging you. I have to talk to her."

"You’re not getting anything out of me. I am never telling you where she is," she said.

"Lane wants to forget you. She’s trying to move on from her unrequited love for you."

Ethan blinked, his brow furrowing in confusion. "Unrequited love? What are you talking about?"

"Lane has been in love with you for forever, Ethan," Ava revealed. Ethan just stood there, speechless. "She loved you for a long time, but she kept it buried because she knew you loved someone else. She didn’t think she was allowed to love you since you were her cousin’s boyfriend."

He just stared at her, completely blindsided by the news.

"I saw how much it killed her every time she saw you and Olivia together. She used to tell me how envious she was because her cousin had the heart of the man she wanted. But she never tried to steal you away," Ava continued, her voice starting to crack.

"Did you know that whenever Olivia asked Lane to cook your favorite meals, she always did it? It was the only way she could show her love without saying it. She was happy just loving you from the shadows."

Ava wiped at her eyes.

"And when she got pregnant, she wasn’t even going to tell you. She didn’t want to blow up your life with Olivia. She planned on just disappearing. But things happened, you found out, and you were forced into this marriage. She was already hurting when she loved you in secret, but being your wife was even worse. She dealt with your cold shoulder every single day. She would come to us and cry her eyes out. We told her to leave you for the sake of the baby and her own sanity, but she’d just smile and stay. Do you know why? Not just because she loved you, but because she wanted her kid to have a real family. She wanted her baby to have a father. Her dream was to be a mother with a husband who actually loved her. But it looks like that was just a pipe dream because she got stuck with the wrong guy."

Ava kept talking, but Ethan barely heard the rest. The pain in his chest was becoming unbearable.

"Anyway, Lane wanted you to have this." Ava didn’t wait for a response. She went back inside and returned with a small box, handing it over to him.

Ethan felt his entire world crumble when he saw what was inside. It was everything he had ever given her. Her necklaces and even her wedding ring were tucked inside.

"She wants you to have these back. She doesn’t want anything reminding her of you while she’s trying to start over. She said you can just throw them away."

Ethan couldn’t find his voice. He just stood there staring at the contents of the box while his heart broke into a million pieces.

__________________

Five years later...

"MOMMY!"

Lane’s smile widened the second she heard the voice of her four-year-old, Calvin, as she walked through the door. Seeing him running toward her, she immediately opened her arms to scoop him up.

As soon as he reached her, she lifted him into a hug. She beamed when he planted a kiss on her cheek. In that moment, all the exhaustion from a long day at work just melted away.

"How’s my big boy doing?" she asked, still grinning.

"I’m good, Mama. Aunt Mae is gonna teach me how to color," he chirped. Aunt Mae was the nanny who watched him while Lane was busy running her small coffee shop.

As she watched her son talk, Lane’s smile faltered. Looking at him was like looking directly at his father, Ethan. Calvin was a total carbon copy. There was no denying who the father was because Calvin was a dead ringer for him, like a mini version of Ethan had been dropped into her life.

Fate really had a twisted sense of humor. How was she supposed to move on and forget the past when her son’s face was a constant reminder? It was like Ethan was standing right in front of her every single day.

It had been five years since she made the hardest call of her life, letting Ethan go so he could return to the woman who actually owned his heart. It was brutal and incredibly painful, but she knew staying would have hurt even more. She didn’t want to be the wife he never chose.

She hadn’t just made that choice for herself, she did it for her baby too. Lane didn’t want her child too. Lane didn’t want her child growing up begging for Ethan’s attention.

Even if they were the "legal" family, they weren’t the loved ones. Staying would have been toxic, especially with Olivia pregnant and Ethan being the father of that child too.

So for the sake of her own sanity and her child’s peace, she decided to ghost him and start over somewhere far away.

After her last talk with Ethan, she went straight to Noah for help. She told him she wanted a clean break and needed to get out of town. Noah didn’t think twice about helping her. He knew of a place where she could lay low where no where she could lay low where no one would find her. She also went to her parents, crying and begging them to back her up on the split.

At first, Lane was terrified her dad wouldn’t go for it. He was the one who pushed the marriage in the first place because he didn’t want her to be a single mom or have the baby be "illegitimate." But she was wrong. Her father just hugged her and promised to handle everything.

She told her parents she was leaving, and while they weren’t thrilled, she eventually talked them into it. Noah promised to keep an eye on them too. She didn’t even eye on them too. She didn’t even tell her parents exactly where she was heading, but she promised to check in every day.

That same day, she packed her life into a few bags. She said her goodbyes to her friend Ava and left behind everything Ethan had ever given her. If she was going to move on, she couldn’t keep any triggers around. She told Ava to give it all back to him. Her son was the only thing she needed to take with her.

She and Noah headed to Richmond, Virginia with Mae, who stayed with her through the pregnancy and the birth. Noah dropped her off and headed back home. He couldn’t visit her after that because Ethan was constantly breathing down his neck, demanding to know where she went.

Ethan was relentless. He hounded Noah, Ava, her parents, and even Aunt Grace. Her parents and Ava legitimately didn’t know where she was, so they couldn’t talk even if they wanted to. Only Noah had the location, and she knew he was a vault.

Noah stayed away because Ethan had people tailing him. Ethan figured if he followed Noah, he’d eventually find her. He couldn’t call her either because she’d ditched her old number the day she left

her old number the day she left.

Lane couldn’t wrap her head around why Ethan was still looking for her. Wasn’t he happy she’d set him free? She gave him back to the woman he actually wanted to spend his life with. Why couldn’t he just focus on Olivia and their kid? There were no more hoops to jump through because she’d already signed the divorce papers. All he had to do was sign them himself and they’d both be free.

In five years, she hadn’t heard a peep about Ethan or Olivia. She made her parents and Noah promise never to bring them up. She wanted to forget him. She didn’t want to know if they got married or if they were playing happy family. She knew the truth would just rip open old wounds.

But the pain still lingered, especially when Calvin started asking about his dad. Even at his age, he was already asking where "Daddy"was. Their neighbor had a son Calvin’s age, and they played together all the time. Calvin would see the other dads playing with their kids and he’d start looking for his own.

Every time he asked who his Dad was, Lane froze. She had no idea what to tell him. How do you tell a kid his father has a whole other family?

She tried to block Ethan out, but one day she got an SMS from Uncle Lucas that she’d ignored for the longest time. Curiosity finally won, and she opened it. She immediately regretted it. The SMS was a photo from Olivia’s kid’s first birthday party.

It was a picture-perfect family portrait. Ethan, Olivia, and their child. They looked like a happy family, even if Ethan wasn’t smiling.

Seeing that made her lose it. She cried for herself and for Calvin. Last year, for Calvin’s birthday, it was just the two of them at the

church. They had a tiny party at home, and his grandparents could only sing to him over a video call. It was just them.

Meanwhile, Olivia’s kid got the big, fancy celebration with a father who was actually there.

"Mommy?"

Lane snapped back to reality when her son called her. Her heart ached as he stared at her. In that light, it was like Ethan himself was looking at her.

"Yes, my sweet Calvin?"

"Are you okay, Mommy?" he asked.

"Mommy’s fine, sweetie," she lied.

She could tell he wasn’t buying it.

She could tell he wasn’t buying it. She bit her lip as he reached up and pointed at her eyes.

"Why do your eyes look sad, Mommy?"

Lane blinked. Her son was way too observant for his own good. "S-sad?"

Calvin nodded seriously. "I’ll kiss them, Mommy, then your sadness will go away."

Before she could say anything, he leaned in and kissed her eyelids. Lane closed her eyes tight. "Give Mommy a hug too, baby," she whispered.

"Okay, Mommy."

Before she could say anything, he leaned in and kissed her eyelids. Lane closed her eyes tight. "Give Mommy a hug too, baby," she whispered.

"Okay, Mommy."

As soon as Calvin wrapped his small arms around her, she couldn’t stop the tears. Even after five years, the pain still found its way back, especially when the past came knocking. But having Calvin was her saving grace. He was the reason she kept going. He was her strength.

Visit and read more novel to help us update chapter quickly. Thank you so much!