She fumes as she follows him back to her Toyota. They both get into their respective sides – she in the driver’s seat and he in the front passenger one.
“I am not a practicing witch,” he says, “but my family believes in maintaining tradition. Witches intermarry between clans, and Flora Janssen is from a very old witch family that hails from Salem. Every one of us is betrothed in our teens. Our genealogies are mapped for us by matchmakers to determine which lineages would make the best matches.”
Yes, she suspected that much.
“And you’re going to go through with it?” Her voice is breaking, as is everything else inside her.
God, I never knew he would affect me this much.
“It was not a love match, Shannon.”
“You’re not answering the question. Are you going to go through with it?” Tears are in her eyes again. “What did I mean to you, Lucien? Were you leading me on? Not so much in words, but in actions.” A sob chokes her throat. “Was I just a convenient fuck doll to you . . . to while away the time until your arranged marriage took place?”
“You’re not a fuck doll.” He appears genuinely distressed. “You mean so much more to me than I ever thought possible. At first, I was attracted to your looks, yes. I wanted to have you . . . possess you. But I found myself thinking about you all the time when you weren’t with me. I found myself wanting to see you again and again. That is the truth, Shannon.”
“But you’re still engaged to be married. It doesn’t change anything.” She turns away from him. It is too painful to gaze at him. “Your sister told me everything.”
“My sister!” He is suddenly enraged. “What the hell did she tell you?”
“She told me the truth, nothing more. A truth I expected from you. She told me . . . that if you didn’t go through with this marriage, you’d be cut off.”
He takes all this in. He doesn’t deny it.
“Is this true?” she demands.
After a long while, he nods.
“Then it’s clear what you’re going to do,” she says. “You’re going to go through with your planned wedding and your planned marriage and your planned consummation to produce a family of super-witches.”
“I’d much rather be with you.” This comes out uncertainly.
“Really, Lucien? It’s a lot of money to give up, and I think you have already decided that I am not worth it. Better to do what your father wants of you than to be destitute on account of me.”
“That’s not true,” he says weakly.
“It is true. I can see it in your face. You don’t think I’m worth giving up everything for. And you know what? I don’t blame you. I’m just glad I got to know the truth before it got too deep between us. Unless you never planned it to get deeper than what we have now.”
She can see it all so clearly.
And yet, she can’t blame him. He had never promised her anything.
“No, Shannon,” he says, aghast. “It isn’t like that at all.” He pauses, not knowing what to say next. His hesitation tells her everything she needs to know.
“Goodbye, Lucien,” she says simply. “Please get out of my car.”
He blinks at her, uncomprehending.
“It’s OK. I understand,” she says. “It isn’t as if you promised me anything more than what you gave me. It was I who led myself into false hopes and expectations, something I shouldn’t have done. I bear you no ill will, Lucien, but it is best we end it right here. I deserve better than to be the mistress of a man who must be married to his fate. So you have to get out of my car now, because I need to go home and have a good cry over you.”
He sits there, unmoving. She waits. Part of her is still hoping he would say “I’m going to renounce my inheritance for you” or “I won’t go through with this sham marriage. I’ll tell my father that I want to be with you and to hell with what the coven says”.
But he doesn’t.
After a long while, he opens the car door. His limbs move with a heaviness that she has never seen before. His shoulders droop and he suddenly looks ten years older.
Flashes of their happy times together run in succession through her mind. Meeting him for the first time in the rain. Him gazing at her throughout the arm-wrestling match with Jared. Making love to him in his bedroom at the Chatterly for the first time.
He shuts the passenger door of the Toyota quietly.
“Goodbye, Lucien,” she says to herself.
FALLOUT
Shannon cries, of course.
She cries and cries on her bed. She is miserable and listless, and life seems to have lost all meaning. She can’t eat, and so she sleeps interminably. Her dreams are intermingled with Lucien’s face, Lucien’s hands, Lucien’s wonderful body merging with hers.