At six the next morning, I dragged my suitcase toward the door.

Adrian was sitting on the sofa.

He hadn’t changed clothes.

“You’re still here?” I asked.

“Where are you going?”

“Boston.”

His eyes narrowed.

“For how long?”

“I don’t know.”

I reached for the door.

Adrian stood.

“What about our engagement?”

“There isn’t one anymore.”

“And the agreement between our families?”

“I spoke to my grandfather last night. I’ll take responsibility for breaking it.”

He stared at me as if he were searching for the trick.

In my previous life, I would have been begging him to stay.

Now he was the one blocking the door.

“Elena, what happened to you?”

“Nothing.”

“You spent two years trying to marry me.”

“I changed my mind.”

“Overnight?”

I almost laughed.

Not overnight.

It had taken five years, a ruined marriage and our final moments together in the snow.

But he couldn’t know that.

His phone rang.

Claire.

I glanced at the screen.

“Answer her.”

Adrian didn’t.

“She’s waiting for you.”

“So?”

I froze.

In my first life, Claire’s calls had been enough to make him abandon dinners, birthdays and anniversaries.

Now he silenced the phone.

“You wanted me free,” he said. “I’m free. Why are you running away?”

“Because your freedom isn’t the reason I’m leaving.”

“Then what is?”

I looked directly at him.

“I want mine.”

For once, Adrian had no answer.

I walked around him.

He didn’t stop me.

I thought that was the end.

Three months later, I had a new apartment, a new job and an entirely different life.

I stopped checking Adrian’s social media.

Stopped asking mutual friends about Claire.

Stopped imagining what they were doing together.

Then one afternoon, my grandfather called.

“Adrian is here.”

I nearly dropped my coffee.

“Why?”

“He wants to renegotiate the Blake-Bennett agreement.”

“Then negotiate.”

“He isn’t asking for the business agreement.”

My grandfather paused.

“He’s asking for you.”

I went silent.

That evening, Adrian appeared outside my apartment.

He looked exhausted.

“What are you doing here?”

“I came to ask you something.”

“No.”

“I haven’t asked yet.”

“The answer is still no.”

For the first time, Adrian smiled.

A tired, almost helpless smile.

Then he handed me a small velvet box.

My stomach tightened.

Inside were the two rings I had thrown away.

I stared at him.

“How did you get these?”

“I took them out of the trash.”

“Why?”

“I don’t know.”

He looked at the rings.

“That bothered me.”

“What?”

“You throwing them away.”

I closed the box and pushed it back.

“Then keep them.”

“Elena.”

His voice stopped me.

“I didn’t go to Claire.”

I slowly turned.

“What?”

“That morning. After you left.”

He hesitated.

“I told her I couldn’t keep being responsible for her life.”

I should have felt something.

Joy.

Vindication.

Hope.

Instead, I only felt afraid.

Because this wasn’t how our first life had happened.

“You love her.”

“I thought I did.”

My heart skipped.

Adrian stepped closer.

“But after you disappeared, I realized something.”

“What?”

“For years, whenever I imagined losing someone, I thought of Claire.”

His gaze stayed on mine.

“Then you actually left.”

Silence stretched between us.

“And?”

“And I couldn’t breathe.”

I looked away.

Too late.

Those were the words I had wanted in another lifetime.

But I was no longer the woman who needed them.

“I’m sorry, Adrian.”

I opened my apartment door.

“I won’t marry you.”

He didn’t argue.

He simply nodded.

“Okay.”

That frightened me more than anger would have.

Before leaving, he placed the velvet box on the hallway table.

“One more thing.”

“What?”

His expression became strange.

“Three nights ago, I had a dream.”

My fingers stopped on the door.

“There was snow everywhere.”

I couldn’t move.

“A car had crashed.”

My heartbeat became painfully loud.

Adrian continued slowly.

“You were trapped beside me.”

I stared at him.

Impossible.

“And you were laughing,” he whispered, “because you said even after divorcing you, I still couldn’t marry Claire.”

Every trace of warmth left my body.

Those were the exact words I had spoken before we died.

Words Adrian shouldn’t remember.

He stepped closer.

“Elena…”

His eyes were red now.

“In that dream, I told you something before everything went dark.”

I already knew the sentence.

But hearing him say it shattered the last certainty I had left.

“In the next life, let’s stop hurting each other.”

Adrian looked at me.

Then he asked the question I had been terrified to hear.

“Why do I remember dying with you?”