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I Found the Man Who Never Left After My Ex Came Back
Novelix
new
Completed
Five years after a scandal destroyed my career and my relationship, I ran into Evan at a friend's wedding. He had a new girlfriend, but she seemed determined to humiliate me with the same lies that had ruined my life. I didn't come back for Evan. I came home to marry Noah, the man who helped me rebuild everything when I was alone overseas. When old rumors spread again, I finally fought back—and Noah uncovered the evidence that could clear my name. Evan wanted another chance once he learned the truth. But the man who loved me when no one else would was already standing beside me.
Chapters (3)
Chapter 1
Five years after Evan Cole and I broke up, we met again at a friend’s wedding. We looked at each other for one second, then turned away like strangers.
A tipsy friend leaned close. “Every woman Evan dated after you looked a little like you. Everyone knew they were stand-ins. But his girlfriend now, Mia? She’s nothing like you. Maybe he finally fell in love for real.”
I smiled politely. Evan’s feelings had nothing to do with me anymore. I’d come home to get married.
After the reception, our friends pushed Evan toward me and insisted he drive me to the next stop. His girlfriend, Mia, sat beside him in the back seat. She kept calling him by name and asking about their future wedding.
At the bar, she announced that I was his ex. I didn’t wait for him to explain.
“I’m Serena,” I said. “Evan and I went to school together.”
Mia kissed his cheek, then told everyone she wasn’t the jealous type.
I looked out the window and let the cold air clear my head.
Chapter 2
When a friend offered me a drink, Evan took two glasses and finished them for Mia. He used to do that for me, back when we were broke and building a company together.
At work dinners, he’d swap my drink for his. Once, he’d drunk so much he ended up in the hospital with a bleeding ulcer.
“I won’t let you get drunk,” he’d promised. “I’ll give you a good life, and you’ll never have to touch alcohol again.”
Now he held a glass out to me. “You’ve always handled your liquor. Want to split hers with me?”
“Mia’s your girlfriend,” I said. “You can look after her.”
Mia accused me of resenting Evan for leaving me. I told her the past was old news, unless she wanted to keep bringing it up.
She spun a bottle for a truth game. It stopped in front of me.
“Did you really come back for the wedding,” she asked, “or for something else?”
I took a sip. “I came back to get married.”
Evan’s fingers tightened around his glass.
Chapter 3
Mia suggested another round, then insisted I drink a pitcher of beer. The bottle landed in front of me again and again. I’d barely slept, and the room began to tilt.
Evan finally caught my wrist. “That’s enough.”
Mia pouted and offered one last truth question. She held up her phone. On the screen was one of the photos from the scandal that had ruined my life five years ago.
“How many men were in your sex scandal, Serena?”
The laughter stopped.
I remembered the night the picture had been taken. At a business party, someone drugged my drink while Evan stepped out to take a call. I broke the glass and used a shard to keep myself alert long enough to lock myself in a bathroom. I woke the next morning with my wrist bandaged and the internet full of photos that made it look as if I’d slept with several men.
I told Evan nothing had happened. He held me and said he believed me.
The rumors spread anyway. Clients withdrew, investors fled, and our company’s chance to go public disappeared. I tried to prove I’d been set up, but no one listened.
Mia had just dragged the worst night of my life into the room for a party trick.
