Category: English

1 My college alumni group chat suddenly exploded with activity over two major pieces of news. First, the famous actress, Nicollette Cross, had officially announced her divorce. Rumor had it that a top-tier lawyer had handled her case, securing a massive victory in court and winning her half of her cold-hearted ex-husband’s fortune. Second, that very lawyer was none other than her college sweetheart, Luke Bennett. “He handled his first love’s divorce case? That is literally the plot of a romance novel!” “Please tell me they’ll get back together. They were the ultimate couple back in the day!” During our university years, Luke and Nicollette had sat firmly at the top of the campus couple rankings. Countless people had witnessed their passionate, whirlwind romance. Including me. I looked up at our wedding photo hanging on the wall, staring at Luke’s cool, sharp eyes. A quiet, heavy sadness settled over me. “Luke Bennett usually only takes on high-stakes corporate cases. He never touches ordinary lawsuits. Why would he make such a massive exception for a divorce?” “Because Nicollette is special to him, obviously. He used to spoil her rotten back then. Of course he would break his own rules for her.” “But he’s a senior partner at a top-tier firm now. Is it possible he already has a family?” The chat went quiet for a few seconds after that question. Then, someone quickly replied. “No way. If anyone actually managed to marry Luke Bennett, they’d be bragging about it all over social media. You couldn’t keep something like that a secret.” “Besides, knowing how intense Luke is about his feelings, he’s not the type to settle for a marriage of convenience.” Everyone in the chat simply assumed Luke was single, and the matchmaking comments grew even more frantic. “Back then, it was the spoiled rich girl and the brilliant, low-income law student. Now, it’s the gorgeous starlet and the elite law partner. How do these two always look like they walked straight out of a best-selling romance novel?” “Look at this photo of them leaving the courthouse. Just standing next to each other, the tension is unreal!” I remained silent, staring at the screen. The image in the chat was a paparazzi shot of Luke holding an umbrella over Nicollette as she walked out of the court wearing a mask and sunglasses. His own shoulder was completely soaked by the rain. Their eyes met under the dark canopy of the umbrella. They weren’t saying anything, yet it felt as though they were saying everything. It was a simple tabloid photo, but it captured an intimacy that rivaled the private picture Luke kept hidden. Once, while cleaning his study, I had found a photo tucked away in the deepest corner of his desk drawer. Nicollette was smiling beautifully at the camera. Luke wasn’t looking at the lens; his head was turned toward her, his eyes filled with a quiet, deep tenderness. If you looked closely at the blurred crowd in the background of that photo, you could see my shadow. But Luke’s eyes had never held room for anyone else. He had probably never even noticed I was there. A light knock on the bedroom door pulled me back from my thoughts. “Are you having breakfast?” Luke asked, leaning his head in. 2 The door wasn’t locked. But given the polite, careful distance that defined our marriage, he still knocked out of habit. His shirt sleeves were rolled up to his elbows, revealing the faint, sharp outline of veins on his forearms. He looked effortlessly handsome. “Yes, thank you,” I said, getting out of bed. Breakfast was simple: warm milk and toasted bread. Luke had always disliked bread crusts. He would always tear them off and leave them on the side of his plate, and because I hated wasting food, I would eat them. Over the past two years, this silent exchange had become a routine. Today, he automatically placed his discarded crusts onto my plate. I stared down at them, my fork suspended in the air. Actually, I didn’t like crusts either. But I wasn’t Nicollette, and Luke had never bothered to ask about my preferences. I still remembered seeing him standing outside Nicollette’s dorm building during our college days, holding a bag filled with half a dozen different breakfast options. “My beautiful, stubborn girl,” he had said with an indulgent smile. “You didn’t finish your breakfast last time because you said it tasted awful. Surely one of these will please you today?” Living in the room next to Nicollette’s, I had occasionally been on the receiving end of those leftover breakfasts, thanks to her casual generosity. Luke sat across from me now, eating with the same meticulous, deliberate grace he displayed when dissecting an opponent in the courtroom. He glanced up at me, his voice calm. “Why aren’t you eating?” I pushed the plate aside. “I’m not very hungry.” Luke turned a page of his newspaper. “You should at least drink some milk.” “Luke,” I interrupted him, “did you take Nicollette’s divorce case?” I had never asked about his clients before. This was the first time. Luke paused for a brief second before speaking in a low, level tone. “She married the wrong man. As an old classmate, it was only right to help her out. Besides…” Besides, their relationship went far deeper than mere classmates. They had occupied the absolute center of each other’s lives for four years. I didn’t want to hear the rest of his explanation. Before he could finish, I stood up from the table. “I’m heading to work.” My focus was entirely gone that day. I moved through my tasks like a ghost, feeling a dull, hollow ache in my chest. During a team dinner that evening, I remained quiet, trailing behind my colleagues as we walked through a high-end restaurant downtown. Suddenly, a coworker grabbed my arm, her voice buzzing with excitement. “Oh my god! Isn’t that the famous corporate litigator, Luke Bennett?” I looked up sharply. A few yards away, Luke was standing by a table, his suit jacket draped casually over his forearm. Sitting across from him was a woman in a tailored cashmere coat. Even from behind, I recognized the elegant, familiar slope of her shoulders instantly. 3 I tried to quicken my pace to pass them unnoticed. “The woman sitting across from him… is that Nicollette Cross? Oh my god, Hazel, we just stumbled onto some major celebrity gossip!” my colleague whispered loudly, using my English name. Luke looked up from the menu, his sharp eyes scanning the room until they landed on me. His eyes had always been his most striking feature, intense and deep. Now that he was older, that gaze had only grown more refined and cold. “Hazel,” Luke called out. I froze, turning around slowly to meet Nicollette’s gaze. She was still as radiant and breathtaking as ever, the kind of beauty that made everyone else in the room feel invisible. She rose from her seat with a polite, hesitant smile. “…Hazel? From our class?” Luke’s eyes drifted over me as he gave a soft nod of confirmation. He didn’t offer any explanation about who I was to him, nor did he look particularly guilty about being seen with her. I wasn’t surprised. But a bitter, heavy ache still swelled in my chest. Nicollette looked me up and down. “I remember you. You were always so quiet and small back in college. You’ve grown into such a beautiful woman.” Her words instantly dragged me back to those suffocating college days, when I was a painfully self-conscious orphan, ignored and pushed to the margins of every social circle. I forced a tight, polite smile. “I should get back to my colleagues.” I turned and walked away, finally escaping the weight of their presence. During the dinner, my coworkers couldn’t stop asking questions. “You never told us you went to college with a superstar and a celebrity lawyer! That is so cool!” “We weren’t very close,” I replied quietly. “That’s a shame. Our company tried to hire Luke’s firm for a major restructuring contract last quarter, but the boss couldn’t find anyone to get us a meeting. His rates are astronomical.” “But why are those two dining together? Do you think they’re having a secret affair?” I let out a silent, bitter laugh. Luke’s secret spouse was sitting right here at this table. If he were with Nicollette, he would probably want the entire world to know he had finally married the love of his life. I shook my head and remained silent for the rest of the night. When our group went to pay the bill, the receptionist informed us that a Mr. Bennett had already settled our tab. My colleagues immediately began speculating again, wondering if Luke and I had been close friends in college. I couldn’t tell them the truth, so I simply offered a vague response. “He has always been generous.” Nicollette was generous too. Later that evening, she shared a photo of her dinner with Luke in our alumni group chat, delighting the gossips and triggering a fresh wave of excitement. “Oh my god, I didn’t think Luke even looked at this chat! Seeing the two of you together again makes my heart so happy.” “Luke looks even more handsome now. Honestly, Nicollette is the only woman who could ever stand beside him.” As the messages scrolled rapidly down my screen, my chest tightened. When I arrived home, the house was dark except for a single, warm floor lamp in the living room. Luke was sitting on the sofa, a nearly empty bottle of Romanee-Conti resting on the table in front of him. He was drinking heavily and quickly. For a man who was normally the definition of discipline and control, he only ever lost his composure when it came to Nicollette. My heart ached sharply. I wondered if I needed to see a doctor about this physical pain. From the shadows of the sofa, Luke’s cold voice cut through the quiet room. “Do you have nothing to say to me?” 4 The question was so sudden that I stood frozen for a moment before replying. “No.” Ours was a marriage of quiet convenience, built on polite distance. What right did I have to demand explanations? I knew better than anyone that Luke did not love me. But Luke didn’t let it go. He stood up, walked over to me, and pulled me into his arms. Before I could react, his lips pressed against mine in a sudden, desperate kiss. I went completely stiff, my mind racing. Before I could even raise my hands to push him away, he pulled back. His voice was rough and strained. “We need to talk.” Talk about what? A divorce? Was this kiss just a parting favor, a sweet transition before the end? Panic flared in my chest, and my instinct was to run. “I’m exhausted. I’m going to sleep.” Luke didn’t try to stop me. But that night, as I lay in bed, he reached out from behind and pulled me against his chest, whispering a quiet, heavy “I’m sorry” into the dark. A man only says he is sorry when he knows he has done something wrong. It was the last thing I wanted to hear. The sharp pain in my chest flared up again. It was strange how simple, quiet words could cause such physical damage. The next morning, I woke up early and went to the clinic for a full check-up. The results showed that I was perfectly healthy. Confused and seeking peace, I decided to visit Luke’s grandmother at her estate on the outskirts of the city. The villa was vast and quiet. Luke and I had met because of his grandmother, and our marriage had been put together largely through her gentle matchmaking. She had always treated me with immense kindness. The moment she saw me, her wise eyes softened with concern. “Hazel, sweetheart, did you and Luke have a fight?” I shook my head. We didn’t fight. We didn’t even have disagreements. “That boy has no idea how to cherish a young woman,” she sighed, patting my hand. “I’ll have a serious word with him.” I knew his grandmother had never met Nicollette. She had no idea how incredibly attentive Luke could be when he actually cared. During our university years, Luke was the most photographed student on our campus confession boards. He was lean, sharp-featured, and carried himself with a quiet, scholarly distance. Even in a simple, faded t-shirt, he looked like a prince who had stepped out of a classic tragedy. He was the unattainable, intellectual crush of every girl on campus, keeping everyone at a strict, polite distance. Yet, he had completely surrendered himself to the school’s most notoriously demanding drama queen. He had met Nicollette’s every whim with absolute devotion. He would eat nothing but plain bread for two weeks just to save up enough money to take her to a high-end restaurant she had mentioned in passing, even if she only took a single bite for a social media photo. He had once skipped a final exam to carry her to the campus clinic when she faked an illness just to get out of a physical fitness test. I had never had the luxury of being high-maintenance. I had learned at a very young age that nobody has patience for an orphan’s tantrums. So I grew up quiet, polite, and accommodating. After marrying Luke, I became even more careful. I knew I wasn’t Nicollette. I knew he wouldn’t tolerate my moods. “Luke does love you, sweetheart,” his grandmother said, her eyes filled with gentle sincerity. But I felt only a cold, creeping dread. If Luke truly loved me, why was I constantly living in fear? At that moment, the physical pain in my chest finally made sense. I was terrified.

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1 My roommate, Cassie, was the ultimate player. She was currently dating five different guys online. Since they all happened to ask her out on a first date for the exact same evening, she was terrified of being exposed. To solve her dilemma, she decided to hold a boyfriend auction right in our dorm room. The other four girls in our room happily bought up one guy each. But when it was my turn, Cassie’s face twisted into a mocking sneer. “Bridget, you’re hideous and dirt-poor. Shoving a man toward you would be a crime against humanity.” “The only way you’ll ever get a taste of a man is if you hang around the dark corners of the campus track field at midnight.” By telling me to go to the track field at night, she was mocking me, implying that only under the pitch-black cover of darkness would a man be blind enough to look at me. Unfortunately, I didn’t catch her underlying meaning. Instead, I stood up and asked in a small, tentative voice: “Can I buy the last one?” … Cassie was a master of scheduling. She juggled five online relationships simultaneously, her face glued to her screen all day, sweet-talking them one by one through voice calls late into the night. One minute she’d be sweet-talking Boyfriend A into carrying her to a higher rank in an online game, and the next she’d be sending a breathless, baby-voiced voice note to Boyfriend B, whining that she was craving boba. My bunkmate, Becca, watched this daily show with a mix of awe and deep envy. “Cassie really has all the luck,” she sighed. “Managing five guys at once? She’s single-handedly meeting the relationship quota for our entire floor.” “What if all five of them ask to meet up on the exact same day?” I couldn’t help but ask. Cassie poked her head out from behind her bed curtains, giving me a dismissive smirk. “I’m not an idiot, Bridget. I’d never let that happen. If you have so much free time to worry about me, why don’t you go jog on the track tonight? Who knows, maybe some blind fool will bump into you in the dark.” “Why the track at night?” Becca asked, genuinely confused. Only a cruel snicker from Cassie answered her. The others caught on instantly, their lips curling into nasty, quiet smirks. A familiar, sharp ache bloomed in my chest. I was born with dull, dark skin and heavy monolids. Growing up in grinding poverty meant years of hard labor in the fields, leaving my stature stunted. When she told me to run at night, she was mocking me, saying that only under the cover of pitch-black darkness would a man be blind enough to look at me. I silently climbed back onto my bunk and drew my curtains shut, sealing out their malice. The curtain was a tattered, hand-me-down piece left behind by a graduating senior. I had smuggled it back to our room while the dorm mother wasn’t looking. But none of us could have guessed that my idle question would turn into a prophecy. A few days later, Cassie was pacing the room in a frenzy, her fingers flying across her phone screen. In a fit of rage, she slammed her phone onto the desk. The sound made my stomach sink. That phone cost nearly a thousand dollars, equivalent to months of my living expenses. Sensing my gaze, her face twisted in fury. She stormed over to my bunk, hauled me down, and slapped me across the face twice, hard. My ears rang, and my head spun from the sheer force of it. The commotion drew the others, but they didn’t care about the red welts swelling on my cheeks. They only cared about why Cassie was so angry. “It’s all this peasant’s fault!” Cassie snarled, pointing a shaking finger at me. “Her jinx of a mouth actually worked! Every single one of my guys demanded to meet in person tomorrow night. They won’t take no for an answer. They said if I don’t show up, we’re over!” She was too blinded by rage to notice the brief, satisfying glints of schadenfreude passing over the others’ faces. “Oh, what a nightmare,” Valerie murmured. She was the prettiest girl in our dorm, crowned the department’s beauty queen, but she was also incredibly green with envy. She hated how many handsome guys Cassie juggled. Watching Cassie face a total romantic collapse was probably the highlight of her month. “I guess you’ll just have to make a choice and dump the rest.” But Cassie didn’t look defeated. Instead, she fell quiet, her lips curling into a secretive, chilling smile. “Do you guys want boyfriends? I’m offering a sister discount.” And just like that, a boyfriend auction began in our cramped room. I, the girl who had just been slapped for absolutely nothing, was instantly forgotten. 2 “First up is a varsity athlete from the neighboring college,” Cassie announced, scrolling through her photos. “Six-foot-two, tanned, rock-hard abs.” She passed the phone around. The girls gasped. “Tara, you’re always working out and you love extreme sports. This jock is perfect for you. You two would have so much in common.” She leaned in, whispering something into Tara’s ear. I sat on the edge of the room, but from her lip movements, I could make out three words: seven-inch prize. Tara bit her lip, hesitated for a second, then pulled out her phone to scan Cassie’s Cash App code. She sent over half her monthly allowance. One hundred and fifty dollars. To me, that was enough to buy cheap instant noodles and stale bread to survive for months. Seeing someone take the bait, Cassie struck while the iron was hot, pushing the next target. “Next, we have the starving artist type,” Cassie pitched, moving to the second profile. “He’s broke, but his face is pure luxury. A sugar mommy tried to buy him a Mercedes last term and he turned her down to keep his pride. He’s incredibly sweet and attentive. Perfect for Regina.” Regina was a rich girl with a spoiled princess attitude. During our freshman year, I had practically acted as her maid, fetching her water and hand-washing her delicate undergarments just to earn a few crumbs. But she found my face too repulsive to look at and quickly hired a poorer student from across the hall instead. Regina didn’t care about money. Spending a hundred and fifty bucks for a handsome plaything to massage her ego was a steal. Cassie turned her gaze toward Valerie, her smile sharpening. “This next one is four hundred dollars. But Valerie, I know you’ll want him. He’s a corporate VP. Sure, he’s a bit older, but he’s incredibly generous. That Chanel bag in my closet? He bought it for me.” “You’re gorgeous, Val. Your charm is way better than mine. Play your cards right, and he’ll probably clear those online credit cards you’ve been hiding from the dean.” It was a blunt slap to Valerie’s pride, a silent jab at her materialism. But despite her annoyance, Valerie paid up. She desperately needed a savior. If she didn’t clear her debts soon, the collection agency would notify the university. Becca grew anxious, grabbing Cassie’s arm. “What about me, Cassie? We’re best friends, you can’t leave me out!” Cassie let out a soft snort, showing her a profile screenshot. “Wouldn’t dream of it. A top-tier pro-gamer. He’ll carry you through every match, gaming queen.” Becca’s eyes lit up, and she squealed with delight. “What about the last one?” Valerie asked suddenly, her eyes narrowing. “Aren’t you going to introduce him?” Cassie waved her hand dismissively. “Oh, the fifth one is pretty average. He doesn’t have any outstanding qualities.” She sounded modest, but the smug triumph in her eyes was impossible to miss. “Average” meant he had no flaws. He was a perfect all-rounder: wealthy, handsome, athletic, and attentive. I didn’t catch her underlying meaning. I stood up, clutching my pockets, and asked in a small, trembling voice, “Can I buy the last one? I… I can pay a hundred dollars first.” 3 They all turned to look at me. The silence in the room was instantly filled with sneers, disgust, and disbelief. My face burned hot. I squeezed the crumpled bills in my pocket, bracing myself against their sharp, judging eyes. Cassie’s smile vanished. She slowly sauntered over to my corner. She pinched the sleeve of my pilling, oversized sweater between two manicured fingers, then yanked a strand of my dry, straw-like hair. “Bridget,” she drawled, her voice dripping with pity. “Do you even own a mirror?” “Look at yourself. You’re ugly, you’re dirt-poor, you can barely afford to eat, and you walk with a limp. Shoving a man toward you would be a sin.” Valerie giggled, covering her mouth. “Don’t be so harsh, Cassie. She really can’t afford a mirror. That sweater she’s wearing? I watched her fish it out of the communal recycling bin down the hall and scrub it like it was some designer piece.” Every ounce of my dignity was stripped bare before the very people I had to live with every single day. My face throbbed with a burning heat, and I could no longer tell if it was from the slaps I had received earlier or the crushing weight of my own shame. As they squealed and added their new targets on their phones, discussing what they would wear for their dates, I crawled back behind my curtain. I huddled in the dark like a sewer rat. But I had perfect vision, and a flawless memory. When Cassie had opened the contact page of the man she had kept for herself, I had memorized his username. Staring at my cracked screen, I typed in the username. His profile picture was an abstract, dark portrait that felt strangely cold. A spark of pure, quiet malice flared in my chest. I tapped the send button without a second thought. The request was accepted almost instantly. Hi, I typed. I’m Bridget. The next evening, the four girls spent hours putting on makeup and doing their hair. They left the room in a cloud of expensive perfume, laughing and chatting about their dates. Meanwhile, the mastermind behind all these dates remained in the room with me, with no intention of going out at all. Cassie was furiously tapping on her screen, the rhythmic, violent clacking revealing her mounting frustration. I curled up on my mattress, pulling my blanket over my mouth to muffle my silent, hysterical laughter until tears leaked from my eyes. Before curfew, the roommates began trickling back into the dorm. Only Tara sent a message to our group chat, telling us she wouldn’t be returning tonight and asking us to cover for her. It seemed she was already getting her money’s worth. As we lay in the dark, the girls began whispering about their encounters. Becca gushed about her gamer guy, saying he was witty, charming, and seemed to come from a wealthy family. She was completely smitten. Valerie came back with a delicate box. A shimmering Van Cleef bracelet now rested on her wrist. Regina didn’t say much, but she begrudgingly admitted her handsome artist was even more stunning in person than in his photos. But as the gossip died down, Valerie noticed how silent Cassie was. For someone who loved bragging more than breathing, keeping quiet about her “perfect” date made no sense. “Hey Cassie,” Valerie called out, her voice dripping with faux-innocence. “How did your night go? You haven’t said a word.” “It was fine,” Cassie muttered. Her voice was flat. Even Becca noticed the tension. “Cassie? Is everything okay?” Realizing the spotlight was on her, Cassie’s pride kicked in. She began to spin a beautiful lie, describing how incredibly attentive her date was and how he had fallen head over heels for her. “But you were in the dorm room the entire night, weren’t you?” I threw the words into the darkness like a bomb. The room fell into a suffocating, dead silence. In the quiet, I could hear Cassie grinding her teeth so hard they threatened to crack. “Ha,” I let out a sharp, ugly little snicker.

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1 Brent returned from another trip with gifts for Evelyn and her daughter, Eva. This time, news of his “grand gesture” broke online before he even landed—a medieval Scottish castle bought to fulfill their princess fantasies. He walked in frustrated. “The media ruins everything,” he muttered. “I spent weeks securing that estate, and some reporter steals the surprise.” I cut him off. “Where’s my gift?” He blinked, then tossed a cheap plastic magnet onto the table. “Figured you’d love another souvenir. Go on, guess the city.” I stared at the mass-produced junk, its barcode still peeling off. Sixty-eight trips. Sixty-eight magnets. Meanwhile, Evelyn and Eva got custom jewelry, antiques, and now a castle. The exhaustion settled into my bones. Right in front of him, I tore every identical magnet off the fridge and threw them in the trash. “Cheap plastic garbage,” I said, a bitter smile on my lips. “What made you think I ever liked these?” Brent frowned, his expression a mix of confusion and irritation. “Audrey, don’t be so childish,” he said. “If you don’t like them, tell me what you want, and I will bring it back next time.” I met his gaze, my voice flat. “Do you even know what I like, Brent?” “What do you like, then?” “When you bought those gifts for Evelyn, did you ever have to ask what she liked?” He didn’t answer. He didn’t have to. That was why every gift he gave her was a thrilling surprise. In eight years, Brent had managed to anticipate every single one of her desires, yet he knew absolutely nothing about his own wife. Brent chuckled, dismissing the tension as if it were a minor annoyance. “It has been so long, Audrey. Are you really still jealous of her? I told you before, we have to keep Evelyn’s emotions stable. If she spirals, what will happen to her daughter? Right?” We? Yes, I had been dragged into this twisted sense of duty too. Evelyn had suffered from severe depression after her messy divorce, and her mental health remained fragile. Because of her, and because of Eva, Brent had to be on call twenty-four hours a day. He would leave at a moment’s notice, whether it was a holiday, in the middle of our private moments, when I was sick, or on the day our five-month-old daughter died. One phone call from Evelyn, and he would run to her. And my only job was to endure. To swallow the loneliness, the rage, and the grief. Seeing my silence, Brent stepped forward and wrapped his arms around me. “Alright, next time I go abroad, write me a wishlist. I promise to buy everything on it, okay?” I wanted to tell him not to bother, but before the words could leave my mouth, the front door clicked open. “Uncle Brent! When are you taking Mommy and me to our castle?” It was Eva and Evelyn. Brent had given them the security code to our house without my consent. He had said, “Our home is Evelyn’s home too, Audrey. She should feel welcome.” Only now did I realize that this was indeed their home, and I was the intruder. Brent immediately let go of me and scooped Eva up in his arms. “How about tomorrow?” My chest tightened with a sharp, physical ache. I thought of our honeymoon, a trip we had planned for eight years but never took. Every year, when I asked him about it, he said he was too busy. He was too busy for me, yet he could always find the time to whisk Evelyn and Eva away on a whim. “So soon? I haven’t even packed yet,” Evelyn murmured, gently swatting Brent’s shoulder, her eyes brimming with delight. “No need to pack. I’ll have everything bought and waiting for you,” Brent said, smiling. Watching the three of them, they looked like a perfect, happy family. It made my eyes sting. Evelyn finally seemed to notice me, stepping forward to warmly take my hand. “Audrey, you should come with us! The more, the merrier. Brent is so wasteful, buying such a massive place. There is no way we can use all that space. You can choose a room for yourself, Audrey, your own little corner.” Her words reminded me of the tiny magnet in the trash. A grand castle for them, and a single, small room for me. That was my worth in their eyes, and in his. I pulled my hand back, my voice cold. “I’m not going.” Evelyn’s face fell, her expression turning hurt and apologetic. “Are you upset with me, Audrey?” Brent frowned, drawing Evelyn behind him. “Audrey, don’t take your moods out on others. I’ll take them for just two days, and you can use the time to cool down. Send me what you want.” “Uncle Brent, I got a new princess dress! Come see it at our house!” Eva urged, pulling at his sleeve. Brent agreed. He hadn’t even been home for an hour, and he was already leaving with them. I called out to him before he could step through the door. “Brent, do you even know what tomorrow is?” “What?” Brent looked back, genuinely confused. “It is our daughter’s memorial.” 2 Brent froze, a look of conflict finally crossing his face. Seeing his hesitation, Eva’s lower lip trembled, and she began to cry. “Are we not going? No, Uncle Brent! Eva has been waiting for days! You promised!” Evelyn pulled Eva back, her voice firm but gentle. “Eva, stop. Audrey has something very important to do with your uncle Brent today.” They called me Audrey, but they called him Uncle Brent, as if he and I had no relation at all. And Brent had never once corrected them. Brent looked at Eva’s tear-stained face, then turned to me with a sigh of helplessness. “The itinerary is already set, Audrey. It’s difficult to reschedule. How about I make it up to you? I’ll head straight to the cemetery to visit Grace the moment I get back.” He was suggesting we postpone a memorial. It was laughable, really. He only dared to suggest it because Grace could no longer cry or call him “Daddy.” But she was his flesh and blood, only five months old when she passed. It had been six years since we lost her, and I wondered how many times he had actually thought of her. Not a single toy he bought Eva ever made its way to Grace’s grave. He had even forgotten her memorial. My hands shook at my sides. I took a deep, shuddering breath and finally spoke. “Fine.” Grace probably didn’t want to see this kind of father anyway. Brent sighed in relief, as if a great weight had been lifted from his shoulders. “Thank you for understanding, Audrey. Pick any gift you want, and I’ll find it, no matter how far I have to go.” I looked at the drawer of the coffee table, a quiet decision solidifying in my mind. I forced a faint smile. “Go on then.” They left. I stood in the quiet living room for a long time before opening the drawer to pull out the divorce agreement. It had been sitting there for two months, drafted the day after I received his last cheap souvenir. Back then, a tiny shred of hope still lingered in my heart. I had told myself that if Brent showed some real care on his next trip, I would rip the papers up. Now, there was no need. This agreement would be the gift I requested. The next morning, Brent left early. He pressed a light kiss to my forehead before slipping out, the one ritual he never forgot, the last soft spot in my heart. My eyelashes fluttered, but I pretended to sleep. Now, even that soft spot had turned to stone. Once he was gone, I got out of bed. I packed a basket with toys and sweets and drove to the cemetery alone. Six years ago, during a raging storm, Evelyn had called to say she was terrified, and Brent had rushed to her side. There were no cars, cabs were impossible to find, and the emergency lines were completely busy. Out of options, I had wrapped my feverish baby girl in a waterproof bag, strapped her to my back, and run through the pouring rain to the hospital. By the time I arrived, it was too late. Brent didn’t see her lifeless body until the next day. He wept and said he was sorry, but the funeral was rushed because Eva had fallen ill, and he had to go nurse her. “He wasn’t a good father, Grace,” I whispered, kneeling before the headstone. “Don’t think of him, it will only make you sad.” “You’re right. I wasn’t a good father. I’m sorry.” The voice behind me made my entire body freeze. I turned around in disbelief to find Brent standing there, holding a plush rabbit, his head bowed. “Weren’t you supposed to be on a flight?” I asked. “The flight was grounded due to the weather. The trip has been delayed.” So, it was because of a flight delay, not guilt. Knowing the truth actually made me feel lighter. He knelt beside me, placing the plush rabbit down. I recognized it instantly. It was the stuffed animal he had bought Eva last holiday season. “Isn’t this the toy you got for Eva?” I asked, my voice rising. “Yes, but she has too many toys to play with. This one is practically brand new.” My eyes burned with unshed tears. “You brought a secondhand toy that someone else didn’t want for our daughter?” “I didn’t think about it that way,” Brent said, looking baffled. “Do you want me to go buy a new one right now?” I snatched the rabbit and threw it back into his arms. “No need. Grace doesn’t want it.” Brent’s face darkened as he held the toy. “Audrey, we shouldn’t fight in front of our daughter’s grave.” “We shouldn’t. But you’ve done plenty of things you shouldn’t have, or our daughter wouldn’t have died in the first place!” I stood up abruptly, casting one last look at the headstone before walking away. Brent caught up to me at the cemetery gates, grabbing my arm. “Stop being angry,” he pleaded. “Evelyn felt terrible for holding me back, so she cooked a whole dinner for you. Let me take you there.” “No.” “Audrey, can you stop making a scene? We are trying our best to make it up to you, especially Evelyn. She is struggling with her own illness, yet she’s still thinking of you!” “Oh, so you’ve always known you were hurting me?” I asked, looking at him with mock surprise. “Then why keep doing it? Do you think a plate of food or a few cheap gifts can erase the damage? Can it bring my daughter back, or make me forget the scars?” 3 Brent froze, the grip on my wrist tightening. For the first time, I saw real guilt and panic flicker in his eyes. After a long silence, he spoke, his voice thick with emotion. “Audrey, I was careless. I neglected you. Let’s not go to Evelyn’s. Let’s have dinner, just the two of us. I’ll spend the whole day with you.” We hadn’t gone on a date in years. He knew it, but he had waited until our marriage was in ruins to try and change. I didn’t refuse him. I wanted to see just how far his sudden guilt would carry him. We drove away from the cemetery, and he took me to a small, quiet diner we used to frequent when we were dating. It had been seven years since we last stepped foot inside, but the rustic decor hadn’t changed at all. The owner came over to greet us, his eyes widening when he saw me. “Well, look at that! After all these years, this lovely girl is still by your side!” I froze. Brent quickly interrupted, his expression tense. “Actually, we’re married now.” “Really? Then the other woman and child you’ve been bringing here these past few years…” Before the owner could finish, his wife slapped his shoulder. “Mind your business and get back to the kitchen! Sorry, dear, my husband gets confused easily. Don’t mind him.” But I knew he wasn’t confused. The other woman and child were Evelyn and Eva. Even this sanctuary of our past had been overwritten by them, and Brent was the one who did it. It was fine. Leaving would be easier if nothing was left untainted. “Audrey, don’t overthink it,” Brent whispered quickly. “Evelyn is a picky eater, and this is one of the few places she actually likes. That’s why I brought her here.” “I don’t own the restaurant,” I replied, looking down at the menu. “Bring whoever you want.” Brent’s fingers twitched, but he didn’t press the matter. He turned to the owner’s wife and ordered my old favorite dishes, all of them spicy. “Actually, I can’t eat spicy food anymore,” I said. “Let’s get something mild.” Brent stared at me. “Since when?” I offered him a thin smile. “Since my tumor surgery.” Three years ago, I had a benign stomach tumor removed. When I told Brent about the diagnosis, he was on vacation in Paris with Evelyn. “Since it’s benign, I won’t rush back,” he had said over the phone. “I’ll ask my parents to look after you.” The medical consent form had listed a fifty percent risk of complications, but he had ignored it, or perhaps he had never bothered to read it. My parents had stayed with me until I was discharged. Brent’s face drained of color. “Why didn’t you tell me? If I had known, I would have come back.” “There was no need. We barely eat together anyway.” This dinner would likely be our last. “I’m sorry,” he said, looking down. “I’ll make sure to be there for you from now on.” I offered no response. When the food arrived, it tasted like ash in my mouth. Food only tastes good when you’re sharing it with the right person. Sitting across from someone who made my chest ache, every bite felt like a chore. As I swallowed the last bite, Brent’s phone rang. It was Evelyn, her voice trembling and wet with tears. “Brent, Eva couldn’t wait for you guys. She tried to climb onto the table to eat and got burned by the hot soup. Brent, what should I do?” Brent stood up so fast his chair scraped loudly against the floor. “Didn’t I tell you not to wait for us?” “But Audrey didn’t come, and I felt so guilty. Brent, is this my fault? Am I just a burden?” Brent broke into a cold sweat. “Calm down. I’m coming right over.” He hung up and turned to me, his gaze suddenly cold. “If you hadn’t thrown a tantrum today, this wouldn’t have happened. Are you satisfied with this kind of payback?” 4 Brent rushed out into the pouring rain, his figure quickly disappearing into the gray sheets of water. I let out a soft laugh, picked up my fork, and kept eating. The owner’s wife walked by, and I looked up at her. “The food is still as wonderful as it was years ago.” She pulled a tissue from her apron and gently handed it to me. “Thank you, dear. But let me get you a tissue, otherwise the food will taste too salty.” I reached up to touch my cheek. I was crying. I still hadn’t managed to hold back the tears. It was pathetic, really. I took a cab back to the house. The balcony window had been left open, and the plants we had bought together at the nursery were broken and drowned by the storm. They wouldn’t survive. Brent had never cared for them, leaving all the watering and pruning to me. Now, I didn’t have to care anymore. I opened the closet. Most of the clothes inside were mine. Over the years, Brent’s wardrobe had slowly migrated to Evelyn’s place, piece by piece. I packed my belongings into a single suitcase, placed the signed divorce papers on the coffee table, and sent him a text. “Brent, I’ve decided on my gift. The wishlist is at the house. Swing by and pick it up before you leave.” Within a minute, my phone rang. I answered, and Brent’s frantic voice came through. “Aren’t you even going to ask how Evelyn and Eva are doing?” “You’ll take good care of them,” I said. He was silent for a long time, struggling to keep his temper in check. “Take a photo of the list and text it to me. I have to look after them for a few days, so I won’t be coming back to the house.” “Then come get it when you’re finished.” “Why can’t you just send a photo?” I didn’t answer. I hung up the phone. A second later, his text arrived: “Are you really still trying to make things difficult for me?” “You can buy an entire castle in Scotland,” I replied. “But swinging by the house to pick up a list is too much of a chore?” He didn’t reply for a long time. Finally, a single text came through: “I’m sorry.” I swiped the notification away, grabbed my suitcase, and walked out the door. I was born and raised upstate in Vermont. I had moved to this bustling southern city only for him. Now, it was finally time to go home. During my first few days back in Vermont, Brent began texting me constantly. He told me what he ate, what he did, and how Evelyn’s condition had stabilized. He wrote that Eva’s burns were healing well, that they had postponed the trip to Scotland, and that he would buy me a real gift on his next trip. I didn’t reply to any of them, nor did I answer his calls. Then, a week later, he sent another message. “I’m home today. I bought your favorite cheesecake from the bakery. I really want to see what’s on your wishlist. Are you asking for the stars?” He was trying to joke, but I knew he wouldn’t be laughing for long.

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My daughter always loved telling the truth. When I asked her if she thought I was pretty, she looked right at me and said, “Honestly Mom, you are the ugliest mom at my whole preschool.” When my mother-in-law pointed her finger in my face and called me a wasteful spender for buying her an expensive backpack, I asked my daughter how that made her feel. She smiled and said, “Honestly, I was pretty happy watching you get yelled at.” My husband once joked with her, asking if she would take care of me when I got old. She scoffed. “I am not taking care of her. When she gets old, she should just hurry up and be put six feet under.” My heart went completely cold. But her eyes curved into happy little crescents. “I am just telling the truth!” Later on, a detective came to our house doing a routine neighborhood canvas and asked my daughter a few standard questions. Once again, my daughter told the truth. But this time, it was a truth she would regret for the rest of her life. 1 The detective knocked on our door to update the local residential registry. My seven-year-old daughter, Brenda, blinked her big eyes and asked, “Why do you have to write our names down?” The detective gently patted her head. “It helps keep the neighborhood safe, and it helps us make sure bad people do not kidnap little kids.” Brenda nodded, her face suddenly lighting up with an exaggerated look of realization. “Oh, I get it! You want to catch kidnappers! Well, isn’t my mom one of those?” “She told me out of her own mouth yesterday that she kidnapped me!” The smile froze completely on the detective’s face. I stared at my daughter in absolute shock. Seeing the sly, calculating gleam in her eyes, my brain started to buzz. Brenda had a habit of saying “honest” things specifically designed to humiliate me and cause me pain. Just yesterday, I refused to let her eat too much junk food before dinner. She threw a fit, calling me an evil mother and screaming that she didn’t want to be my daughter anymore. I was exhausted and furious, so I snapped back, “You’re right, you aren’t my daughter! I kidnapped you!” At the time, she argued back saying she didn’t believe me. I never imagined she would take a sarcastic comment she didn’t even believe, package it as the “truth,” and feed it directly to a police officer. The detective was already looking at me with a completely different expression. I forced out a dry, awkward laugh. “She was misbehaving yesterday and I lost my temper. It was just a stupid joke. I didn’t think she would take it literally.” The detective’s brow relaxed slightly. He turned to Brenda. “Little girl, you can’t joke about things like that. If your mom gets mistaken for a kidnapper, she could go to jail.” Seeing Brenda nod, the knot in my chest finally loosened. I thought the ordeal was over. But a second later, Brenda looked up with an expression of pure, innocent sincerity. “But my mom can’t have babies. If I wasn’t kidnapped, where did I come from?” The scrutiny and suspicion instantly returned to the detective’s eyes. I panicked and quickly tried to explain. “I had an IUD put in right after she was born! When kids hear about birth control, they misunderstand what ‘can’t have babies’ means.” I tugged on Brenda’s sleeve, silently begging her to stop talking. She refused to listen. “Mom couldn’t have babies right after she got married! But I am already seven years old!” I had no idea how a seven-year-old girl possessed the mental capacity to connect those dots. But when you thought about what she was implying, it was impossible not to jump to horrible conclusions. My husband and I had been married for six years. I had an IUD for those exact six years. So how could we possibly have a seven-year-old daughter? The detective clearly did the math in his head. His expression turned dead serious. “Ma’am, I am going to need to see the child’s birth certificate.” My stomach dropped to the floor. There was no birth certificate for Brenda in this house. Six years ago, I had literally fought off human traffickers to rip this child out of their hands. When the police eventually pulled the files on her biological parents, the reality left everyone speechless. My husband and I had looked at each other with pale faces, sharing the exact same thought. If we sent this poor baby back to her biological family, living with them would be a fate worse than death. We simply couldn’t bear it. So, we went through the system, adopted her, and raised her to this day. Brenda probably thought my angry comment yesterday was just a cruel joke, but she had no idea that the joke was actually the truth. The only reason we never told her was that we didn’t want her to feel like an outsider in her own home. But now, if I didn’t confess, this detective might actually put me in handcuffs. Just as I opened my mouth to explain the adoption, Brenda suddenly shrieked in mock excitement. “Oh! I remember now!” “Mom got pregnant out of wedlock! She had me before she got married! When the grown-ups talk about women being loose, this is what they mean, right?” I stood frozen in place. If things were really the way she was describing them, I would have wanted the floor to open up and swallow me out of shame. But my silence in that moment wasn’t born of embarrassment. It was born of a chilling, profound heartbreak. Thinking she had successfully pierced my armor, the corners of Brenda’s mouth curled up into a thrilled little smirk. “Mom, I am just telling the truth to help clear your name! You shouldn’t be mad at me.” The detective withdrew his intense gaze from me, shaking his head slightly as he finished writing down our information. In a corner where no one could see, my hands were curled into fists, my fingernails biting into my palms as I desperately pushed down the surge of bitter emotion. This was not the first time she had done something like this. 2 Back when she was in preschool, she constantly praised other mothers in front of me, talking about how gorgeous they were. I asked her, “Do you think Mom isn’t pretty?” Brenda stared dead into my eyes and said, “Mom, you are not pretty at all!” “You are the ugliest mom at the whole preschool!” I was stunned. Seeing her eyes curved into happy little slits, clearly enjoying the moment, I couldn’t help but speak up. “When you say things like that, it really hurts Mom’s feelings.” To my surprise, she crossed her arms and put on a self-righteous face. “But my teacher said good kids always tell the truth!” I was left completely speechless. A strange, uneasy feeling took root in my chest. Logically speaking, young children usually have a natural, loving bias toward the people who raise them, especially regarding their looks. But Brenda was different. Later, when she started elementary school, I spent a hundred dollars buying her a shiny, branded Frozen backpack she had been begging for. When my mother-in-law found out how much it cost, she marched over, pointed her finger right at my nose, and screamed at me for wasting Chris’s hard-earned money. Brenda completely ignored the vicious scolding I was receiving. She treated the yelling as background music while she spun around the living room, dancing with her new bag. Later, I couldn’t help but ask her, “When you heard Grandma yelling at me, did you have any thoughts about it?” Brenda rolled her eyes around for a second before locking them tightly onto mine. “Yeah! I thought it was super fun!” Seeing the genuine, radiant smile on her face, my expression completely froze. She stared at me for a long time, drinking in my reaction, before adding her favorite line. “Don’t be mad, Mom. I am just telling the truth.” Just last month, Brenda caught a terrible flu. I didn’t sleep for weeks, staying by her bedside day and night to nurse her back to health. When my husband, Chris, saw that I had lost ten pounds from the stress, his heart broke. He asked Brenda, “Mom is working so hard to raise you. Are you going to take care of her when she gets old?” Brenda glanced at me, pouted her lips, and said, “No way! When Mom gets old, she needs to hurry up and go into the ground!” Chris stiffened in shock. Every ounce of color drained from my face. Yet, seeing our devastated reactions, Brenda actually started clapping and cheering, thrilled by the misery she had caused. I remained completely silent for the rest of the day. Brenda even had the nerve to ask me, “Mom, are you upset again just because I told the truth?” That night, I didn’t close my eyes for a single second. Chris tossed and turned beside me. Breaking the heavy silence, he suddenly whispered, “Whenever she says those things… she has to just be joking, right?” Even his voice trembled with uncertainty. Every single time her words tore me to pieces, a brief flash of malicious joy would appear in her eyes. Then she would deploy her favorite excuse, using “telling the truth” to silence any complaints I had. Remembering all of this, my emotions were reaching a boiling point. I rushed to the door, eager to see the detective out and be done with this nightmare. “Mr. Detective!” Brenda yelled out just as he stepped over the threshold. “If I find out my mom really is a kidnapper, can I call you to arrest her?” The detective gave Brenda a highly complicated look, then glanced back at me. Ultimately, he slipped a business card into Brenda’s hand before walking away. 3 After the detective left, Brenda tilted her head and studied my face. Seeing that I wasn’t breaking down or yelling, a flash of deep disappointment crossed her eyes. I couldn’t hold it back anymore. “Why did you say those things to the officer?” Brenda put her hands on her hips, lifting her chin with total arrogance. “Because I am a good kid who tells the truth!” “If you want to blame someone, blame yourself! You are the one who got mad and said I was kidnapped!” That confirmed it. She purposely fed that story to the police just to punish me for the angry comment I made yesterday. I tightened my fists and asked her one more question. “If Mom really did steal you from human traffickers, but your real parents were terrible people and I kept you to protect you… would you still call the police and send me to prison?” Brenda nodded without a single second of hesitation. “Of course I would! Mom, I told you, I am a good kid who tells the truth!” My heart plunged straight into an icy abyss. Chris had come home from work quietly and had been standing in the hallway for a while. His face was terrifyingly dark. Still, he suppressed his anger, walked over, and patted my shoulder to comfort me. “Maybe… maybe she will grow out of it when she gets older.” Seeing Chris upset made Brenda happy again. She completely ignored our pain. I couldn’t stop the thought from echoing in my head. If Chris and I spent half our lives pouring our blood, sweat, and tears into raising a vicious, ungrateful parasite, why shouldn’t we cut our losses right now? But we had raised her for so many years. I wanted to give her one absolute final chance. I looked at the detective’s business card sitting on the table and spoke deliberately. “Brenda, you really were kidnapped. Inside the safe in our bedroom, there is a file containing all your original records. It has the names of your biological parents on it.” “If you keep using your ‘truths’ to intentionally break our hearts, your dad and I are going to pack your bags and send you back to your real family.” Hearing my tone, the smugness vanished from her young face, replaced by a genuine, age-appropriate fear. She turned to Chris in a panic. “Dad, is she telling the truth?” Chris swallowed his disgust and sighed. “Your mom is just messing with you.” The panic slowly faded from Brenda’s face. She puffed out her cheeks and glared at me. “So it was a lie! I wish I actually had different parents! I hate you, Mom!” Chris’s expression darkened even further. But her entire focus was locked onto me. I played along, forcing a deeply wounded, heartbroken expression onto my face. Only then did her lips part into a satisfied, cruel smile. In that moment, everything became crystal clear. Brenda truly believed she was our biological flesh and blood. Because she thought that bond was indissoluble, she felt completely emboldened to hurt me without any fear of consequences. Any remaining warmth in my heart completely froze over. Late that night, as I hovered on the edge of sleep, I heard the subtle click of the bedroom door handle turning. A tiny shadow slipped into the room. A minute later, the shadow sneaked back out. From the hallway outside, a deliberately hushed, childlike voice whispered into a phone. “Hello, is this the police? Honestly, my mom really is a kidnapper. All the proof is hiding inside her safe. You need to come arrest her right now!” 4 The police response was incredibly fast. I barely had time to throw a cardigan over my shoulders before the front door was aggressively pushed open. Brenda ran crying into the arms of a uniformed officer, pointing a trembling finger at me while wearing a mask of absolute terror. “My mom is a human trafficker! She told me she kidnapped me!” The officer didn’t notice, but from my angle, I clearly saw the wicked, triumphant glint in Brenda’s eyes. It was that exact same thrill of successfully torturing me with her “honesty.” The lead officer stepped forward, his hand resting intimidatingly on his utility belt. His voice commanded authority. “Ma’am, we need you to open the safe in your bedroom immediately so we can inspect the contents.” Chris had been woken by the commotion. He rushed into the living room, panic flashing across his face when he heard the word safe. “You can’t open that!” Taking Chris’s panic as a sign of guilt, the officer signaled to a colleague carrying a heavy breaching kit to step forward. Looking at the heavy metal pry bars hitting the floor, I turned my gaze slowly to Brenda. “Brenda, your dad told you during the day that it was just a joke. Why did you still call the police? Is this what you call telling the truth?” Brenda clamped her mouth shut, conveniently ignoring what Chris had told her earlier. I looked at her with a heavy, loaded stare. “If that safe opens, you are going to regret it for the rest of your life.” Brenda snorted loudly and crossed her arms. “Mom never knows the difference between a joke and the truth. I have to punish Mom.” “This way, Mom will learn to only tell the truth, just like me.” The first lock on the safe popped open with a loud crack under the officer’s pry bar. The heavy steel door swung wide. Inside rested a single, tightly sealed metal lockbox. I looked at Brenda one last time. “If we prove right here and now that you are not my daughter, will you pack your bags and go back to your biological parents?” Brenda answered without missing a beat. “Yes!” “Every time I tell the truth, Mom gets mad. I hate Mom!” The very last microscopic shred of pity I held for this girl evaporated into thin air. The sealed lockbox was a high-density, tamper-proof container I had bought specifically for this. It was incredibly difficult to pry open by force. Watching the officer sweat as he struggled with his tools, I finally spoke up. “I can open it with my passcode. But only if Brenda signs a voluntary relinquishment of parental rights form with me.” Brenda didn’t understand the legal terminology of what a relinquishment form was. But she recognized that I desperately did not want that box opened. Because of that, she nodded eagerly. She pressed her thumb into an ink pad and stamped her print onto the document I printed out. I punched in Brenda’s birthday on the keypad. The box clicked open. Inside lay three neatly stacked files. The first was a legal adoption certificate. The second was a stack of official police reports and news clippings from the day she was rescued from the trafficking ring. The third was a detailed background file on her biological parents. The lead officer read the adoption papers and remained silent. He moved to the second file. His eyes widened in shock. He read the police reports over and over again. When he finally looked back up at me, the suspicion was gone, replaced by profound respect. “You fought off a gang of traffickers to get her back? Lady, you have some serious guts.” Brenda, expecting to see me handcuffed and dragged away, stood completely paralyzed when she heard the officer praising me instead of arresting me. The officer didn’t dwell on his amazement for long. Driven by professional duty, he opened the third file. With just one glance, he froze. He looked up at me in absolute disbelief. “Are… are you sure about this? These are the kid’s real parents?” “You actually want to send her back to them?” The other officers, confused by their sergeant’s reaction, crowded around to read the file. A moment later, every single one of them turned to look at Brenda with eyes full of deep, uncomfortable pity. Everyone was waiting for my answer. I simply closed my eyes and nodded. “The relinquishment agreement is signed. There is no going back now.” Looking at the strange reactions of the adults around her, the reality of the situation finally seemed to pierce through Brenda’s arrogance. Pure terror washed over her face.

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1 We were in a conference room at our vendor’s office when the guy handling our account leaned back, looked me up and down, and suddenly dropped this gem: “Karen, you look seriously intense. Like a straight-up witch.” “And why don’t you wear makeup? It makes you look ancient.” I cut him a look. “Did my company pay your agency just so you could insult me?” He immediately laughed it off, waving his hand dismissively. “Chill, I was just joking! You can’t take a joke? You actually look decent.” My face remained a mask of pure ice. “Did we pay you to rate my appearance, either?” Then, right there in front of the entire room, I pulled out my phone and dialed his boss. “Mr. Reynolds? This is Karen Collins from Lumina Group. We need to talk.” The room went dead silent. The nervous tension was thick enough to cut with a knife. Even Rick, who had been grinning a second ago, went pale. Panic flashed in his eyes. “Whoa, Karen, come on. It was just a joke. No need to blow this out of proportion.” I raised a single finger to my lips, signaling him to shut his mouth. Joshua Reynolds’ voice came through the speaker. “Ms. Collins! What can I do for you? Please, fire away.” “Mr. Reynolds, your account manager, Rick Briggs, has repeatedly subjected me to unprofessional verbal attacks during today’s meeting. He has made derogatory remarks about my appearance and personal character, which is a direct and severe breach of Section 5.2 of our Behavior Guidelines in Exhibit C of our contract.” “Lumina Group is immediately initiating the breach of contract protocol. I expect a written explanation and a comprehensive remediation plan from Aurelia Media within twenty-four hours.” “Furthermore, I demand a formal, public apology from Rick Briggs in front of the entire project team.” The room collectively gasped. Rick’s face turned a violent shade of crimson. “You’re making things up! You’re blowing this way out of context! I never…” I didn’t let him finish. “I am speaking to your direct superior to resolve a contract issue. Why are you interrupting? Where is your discipline? Is this the kind of training Aurelia Media provides its staff?” Joshua, hearing the icy authority in my voice, realized his multi-million dollar contract was on the line. He scrambled to placate me, promising a satisfactory resolution if I just gave him a little time to investigate. I gave a curt nod and hung up. Within three minutes, the vendor’s team cleared out of the conference room like rats fleeing a sinking ship. Since my team had been dragged into this mess, I ordered a round of high-end afternoon tea and pastries to let everyone decompress. Penny, our junior designer, practically bounced over to my chair, her eyes shining with pure worship. “Karen, you are literally my hero! That was the most badass thing I’ve ever seen a boss do!” “You have no idea how much Rick has been getting on my nerves. He does zero actual work, but he loves making sleazy comments to the female staff under the guise of ‘joking.’ And if anyone gets upset, he plays the victim, saying ‘Oh, it’s just a joke!’ He’s a total creep.” “Last week, he told me I should dye my hair because black makes me look depressing. Like, mind your own business, asshole!” “And he did the same to Hannah. He told her she has thick thighs and should only wear long skirts to hide them because pants look hideous on her. Disgusting pig.” My brows drew together. “Why didn’t you tell me this sooner? We are the paying clients here. Since when do we pay vendors to harass our team?” Penny bit her lip. “We just didn’t want to cause a scene. You know how it is, sometimes it feels easier to just bite your tongue and get through the day.” I shook my head. “We don’t go looking for trouble, but we sure as hell don’t run from it. If someone pushes you, you push back.” The rest of the women on my team nodded fiercely, eager to testify about Rick’s constant workplace harassment. Half an hour later, my phone rang. It was Joshua. I pressed the speaker button. Joshua’s voice boomed through, entirely too casual and dismissive: “Hey, Karen. I just looked into the whole situation, and honestly, it seems like a big misunderstanding.” “Young Rick is still green, you know? He speaks before he thinks, but he didn’t mean anything by it.” “As a senior director, surely you wouldn’t want to ruin a kid’s career over a silly slip of the tongue, right?” “Our companies have partnered on so many successful launches. We shouldn’t let a minor hiccup sour a great relationship.” “But don’t worry, I gave him a stern talking-to. I guarantee it won’t happen again!” 2 I tapped my fingernails against the polished conference table, looking around at my team. Their expressions had soured. Of course. Joshua wanted to sweep this under the rug with a slap on the wrist. I let out a cold laugh. “Mr. Reynolds, I think you’ve fundamentally misunderstood the situation.” “I didn’t call you as a friend looking for an apology. I called you as a representative of Lumina Group to formally notify you of a contractual breach. Whether professionally or personally, Rick Briggs must face severe, documented disciplinary action.” “An excuse like ‘he’s young and foolish’ does not cut it.” “If Aurelia Media is staffed by unprofessional children, then Lumina Group will have to seriously re-evaluate the viability of our partnership.” “As the client, I believe we reserve the right to choose partners who actually respect basic professional standards.” “We are done for today. Until your agency delivers a proper, formal resolution, there is no need for further communication.” Without waiting for his response, I cut the call. “Everyone finished eating? Good. Let’s pack up.” “Sam, the moment we get back, pull up the files on the other vendors who made the shortlist. I want a fresh round of evaluations ready by tomorrow morning.” “On it, Karen. I’ll have the packets on your desk before five,” Sam replied. “Let’s go. What a joke of an agency. Imagine trying to insult the client who literally funds your payroll.” As we gathered our tablets and prepared to leave, the conference room door burst open. “Get in there and apologize, right now!” Aurelia’s account director barked, shoving a thoroughly miserable Rick into the room. The director immediately turned to me, bowing and scraping with a desperate smile. “Ms. Collins, please wait! This was entirely our fault. Mr. Reynolds just called and gave us a piece of his mind.” “Especially Rick here. He lost his mind and spoke out of turn. I’ve brought him back to make things right immediately!” He gave Rick a hard nudge, glaring at him to start speaking. Rick’s face was a picture of pure, unadulterated resentment. He looked like a man being dragged to the gallows by the very ‘witch’ he had mocked. He refused to look me in the eye, keeping his head tilted back with a rigid, arrogant posture. When he spoke, his voice was flat and dripping with insincerity. “Ms. Collins, I hope you can find it in your heart to forgive me. I’m a straightforward guy, and I didn’t mean any harm. It was just a casual comment, but since it apparently caused you some emotional distress, I apologize.” “But I also hope you won’t take everything so seriously in the future. Overanalyzing things can warp people’s intentions and create unnecessary drama for everyone.” “As a high-level executive, surely you won’t hold a grudge against a low-level employee like me, right?” I stared at him. Was he actually serious? He was accusing me of being fragile, oversensitive, and vindictive, all while hiding behind the shield of a fake apology. And this was supposed to be a resolution? “I do not accept your apology.” Rick’s eyes flared with rage, glaring at me as if to ask, What more do you want? “My appearance is none of your business, and whether I wear makeup is my own choice and right. As a subordinate from a vendor company and a complete stranger, your unsolicited comments on my looks were vulgar, classless, and utterly unprofessional.” “I’ve also learned you are a repeat offender. Do you think every woman you work with is a target for your sleazy banter? Who gave you that right? Who gave you that kind of confidence?” “Don’t try to mask your disrespect as a joke. We are not friends, and you do not have my permission to speak to me like that.” “If your parents and teachers failed to teach you basic manners, then the world will gladly do it for them.” My words left him completely speechless, his face burning red. Behind me, my team couldn’t help but murmur in quiet satisfaction. Ignoring the account director’s frantic pleas, I walked out of the office, my team following in lockstep. On the ride back, Penny looked a bit anxious. “Karen, if we pull out of this project now, how are we going to explain it to the board?” I gave her a reassuring smile. “Don’t worry. I wouldn’t have walked out if I didn’t already have a backup plan.” 3 Back at the office, I spent two hours analyzing Aurelia’s main competitors and their product offerings. Once I had a solid strategy mapped out, I knocked on the door of our VP, Mr. Harrison. I walked him through the entire incident with meticulous detail, presenting my proposal to transition to a new vendor. I also pointed out several red flags I had noticed in Aurelia’s operations. In the past, we had overlooked their minor slip-ups for the sake of convenience and long-term stability. But if they were willing to assign a completely incompetent, disrespectful idiot to handle a multi-million dollar account, it proved their internal management was decaying. Mr. Harrison leaned back in his chair, weighed the risks, and nodded. “You have my full support on this, Karen. Take the lead and handle it.” I felt a wave of relief. With the green light from the top, I was free to play hardball. Meanwhile, Joshua Reynolds kept blowing up my phone. His voicemails were a broken record of excuses, promises of structural changes, and begging for a lunch meeting. I ignored them all. My time was far too valuable to waste on his empty promises. By the next day, I had blocked his number entirely, leaving the executives at Aurelia Media to sweat in their own juices. The following morning, I walked into the office to find Penny rushing toward my desk, waving her phone furiously. “Karen! Look at this! That absolute bastard Rick is smearing you on social media!” I took her phone. Rick had posted a series of updates on his public feed, accompanied by insulting caricatures of old, hideous witches: “Are vendors not human anymore? Are clients supposed to be gods? Some power-tripping, bitter bitch is trying to ruin my life just because she can’t get a man! Unbelievable!” “Talk about mentally unstable. Imagine getting someone fired over a harmless joke. Get some therapy, lady!” “Women dress up and wear makeup for men anyway. Why is she so pressed? Can’t even handle a compliment!” “She’s clearly projecting her own insecurities because she’s old and ugly. One comment and she loses her mind.” “If she didn’t have that title, nobody would even look at her twice. Desperate old maid.” In the comment section, a friend had asked what happened. Rick had replied: “Just some power-tripping client who got her feelings hurt because I didn’t flirt back. She’s ancient, ugly, and totally unhinged. I wouldn’t touch her with a ten-foot pole!” “Haha, I sell my services, not my body.” So this was the “sincere reflection and deep regret” Joshua had promised me. I let out a cold laugh. “Penny, take screenshots of everything and send them to my email. I have a little gift for Joshua.” I forwarded the screenshots straight to Joshua’s personal inbox. Within sixty seconds, my phone started ringing with Joshua’s ID. I didn’t even look at it. After twenty missed calls, he finally gave up. Over the next two days, as it became clear we were actively shopping for new vendors, panic rippled through Aurelia Media. Lumina Group was their largest client, accounting for over two-thirds of their annual revenue. Losing this contract would trigger a financial collapse. When I checked Rick’s social media again, his feed had been scrubbed clean. Penny, who had a vast network of industry friends, came back with some juicy gossip. “Rick is completely ruined. The board at Aurelia absolutely destroyed him. Everyone in his office is blaming him for jeopardizing the contract. He’s not getting any bonuses, and rumor has it they’re drafting his termination papers as we speak.” I listened without saying much. When Rick was busy throwing insults, he probably never expected that the “witch” he mocked had the power to make his career vanish.

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1 It was during a summer charity drive at Saint Jude’s Orphanage when I stumbled upon my future daughter. She claimed she had traveled back in time, twenty years from the future. I stared at her, my heart fluttering with a mix of dread and dizzying excitement. “You look so much like Todd,” I whispered, studying her face. “How old are you?” “Are Todd and I still happy twenty years from now? He swore to me that he’d cherish me even more after we tied the knot.” I kept babbling, eager for any scrap of our future. But the girl only let out a strange, hollow laugh. “Oh, your bond is spectacular,” she said, her voice dripping with something dark. “Twenty years later, he still treats you like his crown jewel. Last year, when you had a minor surgery, he practically lived outside the operating room, donating half his net worth to charity just to beg the universe for your safety.” A sweet warmth bloomed in my chest. “He always did have a flair for the dramatic,” I murmured, a soft smile tugging at my lips. Before the warmth could settle, her voice drifted over, light as a feather but cold as ice. “But then, a secret lover is always more thrilling than a real wife, isn’t she?” “When the woman on the outside gets a minor headache, the old bastard drops everything, leaving his actual family in the dust.” “Isn’t that right, stepmom?” Maeve seemed delighted by my sheer bewilderment. She wore a mocking grin, as if watching a tragedy unfold in real-time. “You didn’t actually think you were my mother, did you?” “A homewrecker like you doesn’t deserve a daughter.” She spoke with absolute certainty. But it made no sense. Todd and I had signed our marriage papers just last month. How could I possibly be his mistress? “That’s impossible. Who are you? What are you…” Maeve cut me off with a scoff. “Fine. Today happens to be my parents’ wedding anniversary anyway. If you don’t believe me, let’s go see for ourselves.” Half-doubting, half-terrified, I drove Maeve to the address she gave me. It was in the very same gated community where Todd and I lived. But while our townhouse sat on the cheap, dusty western edge of the estate, this grand brick villa stood proudly right in the center. Maeve sneered the moment she stepped out of the car. “Twenty years from now, everyone calls you his little side-chick. Quite the title, isn’t it?” “There. See for yourself.” I followed her gaze, and my entire body turned to stone. Todd, who had held me close and begged for a good morning kiss just hours ago, was leaning down, letting a woman wrap her arms around his neck and kiss him deeply. “Take a good look, stepmom. The woman in there is my actual mother.” “You’re saying… Phoebe is your mother?” My voice cracked, dry as ash. Maeve nodded without a trace of hesitation. It was absurd. Phoebe had been Todd’s executive assistant ever since she graduated college. Whenever she saw me, she would smile warmly, treating me like her closest friend and calling me the future Mrs. At our wedding last month, she had stayed late, drinking toast after toast on our behalf to keep the guests happy until she was completely wasted. I had even nudged Todd afterward, telling him to give her a massive bonus for being so loyal. And now, Maeve was claiming Phoebe was Todd’s real wife. Then what was the marriage certificate Todd and I had signed? “A forgery,” Maeve said. I froze, staring at her in sheer disbelief. She shrugged, her lip curling. “It’s all fake. The ceremony was a sham, the guests were hired actors, and the certificate is just a cheap piece of paper without an official state seal.” I refused to believe it. I couldn’t believe that Todd, the man who had swerved the steering wheel during a car crash to take the full force of the impact to protect me, would trap me in such a cruel, humiliating lie. My knees trembling, I stumbled back to our townhouse. With shaking fingers, I pried open the safe. The moment we got back with the certificate last month, Todd had playfully snatched it away before I could even open it. He had wrapped his arms around me, beaming with pride. “This is our family heirloom now,” he had whispered. “We have to lock it away safely.” Such sweet words. I had happily let him have his way. Now, holding the paper under the light, I realized how laughably fake it was. A child could have spotted the forged stamp. I collapsed onto the floor, the paper slipping from my hand as a cold void opened in my chest. “Why?” I whispered to the empty room. “Why would he do this to me?” Maeve made herself at home, wandering around the bedroom. “Because he’s a greedy bastard. He wanted a respectable wife, but he also wanted to keep his favorite toy.” “My mother’s family has money and connections. They gave him funding, resources, everything he needed to build his empire.” “But you? You stuck with him through his poorest years, so he threw you a bone. He put on a fake show to keep you quiet, locked up in this little cage.” I sat on the floor for hours as the afternoon light faded into dusk, entirely oblivious to when Maeve had slipped out. The moon was high by the time Todd finally returned. He paused at the door, surprised to see me curled up in the darkness of the sofa. “Gemma? Sweetheart, why are you sitting in the dark?” “My meeting ran incredibly late today. I’m sorry.” “But guess what I brought you?” With a boyish grin, he produced a small, elegant box from behind his back. “Strawberry shortcake. You said you were craving it yesterday.” He held it out to me, his eyes bright and warm, looking exactly like the man who had promised to love me forever. I pulled my knees tighter against my chest, staring at this man I had loved for a decade. How could he hold another woman, kiss her, and then come home to look at me with such convincing tenderness? Confused by my silence, his smile softened, and he slid onto the couch to pull me into his chest. “I’m sorry, honey. I promise I’ll be home early tomorrow.” He called me his wife so naturally, with such warmth. But I wasn’t his wife. I was just his dirty little secret. Maeve was like a ghost, appearing out of nowhere. The next morning, as I was about to take my medication, she snatched the bottle right out of my hand. I pressed a hand to my throbbing temple, reaching out. “Give it back, Maeve. My head is splitting.” She turned the bottle around, inspecting the label with mock curiosity. “Wow, stepmom, you started popping these this early?” “I don’t know what my dad saw in you. A pill-popper. How pathetic.” I froze. “What do you mean, pill-popper?” She rattled the pills. “These are heavy-duty psychotropics. Hallucinogens.” “Actually, the timeline fits. You get so hooked on these that you hallucinate, crash your car into someone, and end up in prison.” The moment the words left her mouth, she gasped, slapping a hand over her lips as if she had said too much. Shoving the bottle back into my hand, she quickly poured a glass of water and offered it to me with a tense, fake smile. “I was lying. It’s just ordinary pain medicine. Drink up.” I stared at the plastic bottle, my hands shaking violently. Todd had brought these pills home, claiming they were a cutting-edge prescription for my chronic migraines. Every time my head throbbed, he would look more panicked than I was, personally bringing the water and watching me swallow the pill before he could relax. I had thought it was love. But in reality, he was quietly, systematically driving me insane. Hysteria clawing at my throat, I threw the bottle across the room. It shattered against the wall, pills scattering like teeth. We had been together since we were eighteen. Ten years. During our bleakest times, we shared a damp basement flat, living on instant noodles. I had worked myself to the bone helping him pitch to clients. When a wealthy investor humiliated him, I swallowed my pride and spent weeks kissing up to the investor’s snobbish wife just to secure the deal. When Todd found out, his eyes had burned with tears of shame and anger. “Gemma, never again,” he had choked out, holding my face. “I don’t care if I have to drink myself to death for a contract, but I will not let you degrade yourself for me.” The man who swore he would rather die than see me suffer had handed me the ultimate betrayal. I wiped the tears from my face, turning to Maeve, who was watching me with a blank expression. “What else?” I choked out. “What else did he do?” Maeve stared at me, a dark, unsettling smile spreading across her lips. “Stepmom, do you remember the orphanage where you found me today?” “Why do you think a girl from twenty years in the future would be wandering around that specific place?” My heart leaped into my throat. Before I could press her for answers, the front door clicked open. Phoebe walked in, dressed in a sharp pencil skirt and blazer. She froze when she saw me sitting on the floor, her face twisting into immediate concern. “Gemma? Oh my god, what happened?” I whipped my head around to look for Maeve, but she was gone. Vanished into thin air. Phoebe rushed over and knelt beside me, reaching out to help me up. “Gemma, let me help…” The fake warmth in her voice made my stomach turn. I slapped her hand away with all the strength I had left. “Should you be calling me that, or is it my turn to call you the lady of the house?” Phoebe stiffened. A heavy silence filled the room. Then, slowly, her worried expression melted away, replaced by a cold, amused smirk. “So, you finally figured it out.” “I was starting to think you were genuinely brainless. I left so many clues, you know.” She stood up, smoothing her skirt, and made herself comfortable on the sofa, her posture oozing the confidence of a rightful owner. “Todd and I registered our marriage a year ago.” “Yesterday was our anniversary. Did he tell you he had a late board meeting? He didn’t.” “He bought me a cake, gave me a diamond ring, and took me out to a beautiful dinner. Then he drew me a bath and tucked me into bed.” “My appetite hasn’t been great lately, so I told him to take the leftover cake home to keep you happy. Did you try it? The bakery is exclusive.” She twirled a strand of her hair around her finger, sighing. “Look, Gemma, don’t hate him. He didn’t want to hurt you. He just didn’t have the heart to break the news.” “You did suffer with him through the lean years, after all. He still wants you around to take care of him when I’m busy.” “Besides, you’re a much better cook. He loves those honey-glazed pork chops you make. I can never get the recipe right, mine are always too sweet or too sour. I made them last week, and he barely took two bites before complaining they weren’t as good as yours.” Cold sweat poured down my neck. My head throbbed with white-hot pain. “When did it start?” I whispered. She tapped her chin, smiling. “Three years ago, on your anniversary.” “The office was in complete chaos. He’d pulled an all-nighter but was still insisting on rushing home to buy you flowers. I got annoyed, so I made him stay with me instead.” Her voice began to warp and fade. Spots of blinding color danced across my eyes, and then the world went entirely black. When I opened my eyes, the smell of antiseptic filled my nose. Todd was asleep, his head resting on the edge of my hospital bed. His brow was furrowed, and his fingers were wrapped tightly around mine. I stared at his face, a face I had kissed ten thousand times. A faint white scar ran from his temple to his cheekbone, a permanent reminder of the day he threw himself over my body as the glass shattered around us. I slowly pulled my hand away. The movement startled him awake. He sat up instantly, his eyes bloodshot. Seeing me conscious, his face lit up with overwhelming relief. “Gemma, thank god. You terrified me.” He poured a cup of water, offering it to me. “The doctor said it was an anxiety attack. Sweetheart, have you been skipping your medication?” I stared down at my trembling fingers. “Todd, where is Phoebe?” He blinked, then offered a smooth, easy smile. “She’s my assistant, Gemma. She’s at the office, of course.” “I only sent her to our place yesterday to grab some files. Why do you ask?” Whenever he lied, his left eyebrow would twitch upward. It was a tell he had possessed since he was eighteen, one he had never managed to shake. I closed my eyes, unable to look at him for another second. “Leave. I want to be alone.” “Gemma…” “Go.” A long silence stretched between us. Finally, he sighed, gently tucking the blanket around my shoulders. At the door, he paused, looking back with soft, pleading eyes. “I love you, Gemma.” The words were filled with warmth, but they left me shivering. The moment the door clicked shut, the dam broke, and hot tears streamed down my face. “Oh? Stepmom, are those actual tears?” Maeve stood by the window, her voice dripping with mockery. She leaned over the bed, her fingers surprisingly gentle as she brushed a tear from my cheek. I froze, staring up into her face. Her wide, round eyes held a strange, haunting familiarity. In the next breath, her wicked smile returned. “I didn’t think bad women knew how to cry. How tragic.” “You deserve it. But don’t worry, there’s plenty more misery waiting for you in the future.” Remembering what she had whispered before Phoebe walked in, I lunged forward and grabbed her wrist. “What did Todd do to the orphanage?” Maeve fell silent. She stared down at my hand wrapping her wrist, her eyes glazed over. For a fleeting second, I could have sworn her eyes were swimming with tears. A sudden panic gripped my chest. “Maeve…” Before I could finish, she violently wrenched her hand away. “You brought this on yourself! It serves you right that my dad bulldozed that dump where you grew up and gifted the land to my mother.” My breath hitched in my throat. Maeve paced the room, her voice rising with forced, manic glee. “You were like a shadow, always playing the victim to keep my dad from coming home to his real family.” “But the moment my mother threw a tantrum, he threw you under the bus. He destroyed the only place you ever cared about just to make her smile.” “My mother told me you literally got down on your knees, begging him. She said you sobbed like a dog.” “Didn’t stop him though. They turned your precious orphanage into a waste processing plant.” “After that, you completely lost your mind, turning his life into a living hell with your psychotic episodes.” “You even caused a death. The old lady who ran the place threatened to sue, but she ended up dead in a convenient accident.” “It was my mother’s development project, so of course my dad cleaned up the mess. He swept the old lady’s death under the rug without blinking.” “And you, like a fool, kept screaming for justice. My dad had to hire a specialist to hypnotize you just to wipe your memories and shut you up.” I was discharged a few days later. I went back to the townhouse quietly. Every curtain, every piece of furniture had been chosen by me. I had built this place believing it was the foundation of my happiest years. Instead, it was a gilded cage built on deceit and blood. I had barely finished packing my suitcase when Todd burst through the door, throwing his arms around me in a desperate embrace. “Gemma, you nearly gave me a heart attack. Why did you leave the hospital without telling me?” Resting my head against his chest, feeling the frantic, terrified racing of his heart, I whispered, “Todd, do you love me?” “Of course I do,” he replied instantly, tightening his grip. “Gemma, without you, I would die.” Such grand passion. I let out a silent, bitter laugh. Before I could reply, his phone buzzed in his pocket. He pulled it out with a frown, his face instantly turning pale and conflicted as Phoebe’s name flashed on the screen. “Take it,” I said, my voice dead. He hesitated, then stepped back, moving into the hallway to answer. When he returned, the mask of the apologetic lover was firmly back in place. “Just some trouble at the firm. Get some rest, okay?” “Once this deal closes, I’ll take you on a vacation. Just the two of us.” He pressed a soft kiss to my forehead and hurried out the door. I stared at the closed door, raising my hand to violently wipe his kiss from my skin. There is no vacation, Todd. There is no future. I grabbed my suitcase and walked out, never looking back. At the corner of the street, some inexplicable urge made me stop and turn. Maeve was sitting on the wooden swing set in the garden of the grand brick villa, swaying gently under the shadow of the trees. Seeing me watch her, she raised a hand, waving with a wide, bright smile. The sight sent a strange shiver through me. How odd. She looked absolutely nothing like Phoebe.

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It was our seventh wedding anniversary. My mother-in-law was cooking in the kitchen, and my daughter was playing in the living room. I was charging my drunk husband’s phone when the screen suddenly lit up. It was a SnapChat message. The contact name was “Little Ember”: “Bro, can you still make it tonight? I bought new sheets, the burgundy kind you like.” I swiped open the screen. He had a saved folder in SnapChat called 【Ember’s Wish】. I tapped on it. Ninety-nine photos. Ninety-nine different women. Ninety-nine opened condom wrappers, neatly spread out on his white bedsheets. I stood rooted to the spot, trembling all over. In the living room, my husband drunkenly hugged our daughter, calling out, “Daddy loves you the most.” I smiled at my mother-in-law and said, “Mrs. Davis, I’m going out to buy some soy sauce.” It took me forty-seven seconds to get from our front door to downstairs. In those forty-seven seconds, I replayed every single frame of my seven-year marriage in my mind. His name was Mark, and I met him on a blind date. Back then, I had just left the military. My father was critically ill, my mother had remarried, and I was all alone in the world. When he was pursuing me, he said, “Alice, your first half of life has been too hard. Let me make the second half easy for you.” I gave up my highly sought-after federal job placement, a benefit of my military service, to his younger brother, all because of that one sentence. I sold the old house my father left me to help him get startup capital for his business. I transformed myself from a scout who could carry sixty pounds and cover twelve miles cross-country into a mere housewife. And what did I get in return? He was with “Mistress #1” in a hotel room on a night when I was throwing up so hard I had stomach bleeding from morning sickness. I was in labor for eighteen hours in the delivery room, while he was accompanying “Mistress #12” to her prenatal check-up. For our daughter’s naming ceremony, the gold charm he gave her was just plated. The real one, the solid gold piece, was around “Mistress #38’s” neck. I stood by the apartment building entrance and tapped on the video I had just recorded. Ninety-nine photos, with clear timestamps. From March 17, 2020, the night before our wedding. To February 28, 2026, three o’clock this afternoon. He took the last photo in the spare bedroom while I was in the kitchen. The wrapper was strawberry flavored. I took a deep breath and dialed a number. “General Thorne, it’s Alice.” There was a three-second silence on the other end, then a deep, resonant voice spoke. “Alice? You finally decided to contact me.” I couldn’t help it; my eyes stung. Eight years ago, I saved an old man during a border mission. I didn’t know who he was then, only that he’d been trapped in a collapsed tunnel for three days and three nights. I carried him for six kilometers in a heavy downpour. Later, I learned he was a highly decorated General from a major command. He told me then, “Alice, if you ever have any trouble, call me anytime.” Eight years. I had never made that call. I always thought I could manage my life on my own. “General, I need a lawyer,” I said. “For a divorce case.” “Also, I want to rejoin the military.” The voice on the other end simply said, “Okay.” After hanging up, I looked up at our seventh-floor window. The crooked holiday decorations Lily had pasted on the window for Christmas were still there. My phone lit up. It was a message from Mark: 【Honey, did you buy the soy sauce? Dad says you’ve been out for a long time.】 【Lily’s asking when you’re coming back to watch TV.】 I stared at the text and smiled. When I got home, Mark was sitting on the couch, watching a reality show with Lily. He saw me walk in and eagerly came to greet me. “What took you so long? I thought you got lost.” Lost? I could find my way in a primeval forest, yet I was completely lost for seven years in the marriage you gave me. “The grocery store downstairs was closed, so I had to walk an extra block,” I said, handing him the soy sauce. He took the bottle and turned towards the kitchen. Watching his back, I suddenly felt like he was a stranger.

In the kitchen, my mother-in-law, Mrs. Davis, was dropping meatballs into the hot oil. Mark stood by the stove, looking down at his phone. I stood at the kitchen doorway, watching him type. He looked up, meeting my gaze. His face stiffened. “Wh-what’s wrong?” I smiled. “Nothing. It’s just… you haven’t smiled like that in a long time.” His expression changed. I didn’t say anything more and turned to set the table. Dinner was lavish tonight; Mrs. Davis’s cooking was always excellent. Mark served me food, served Lily, toasted his parents, playing the role of a perfect husband, perfect father, perfect son. I looked at him and suddenly asked, “Oh, by the way, where’s your backup phone? I wanted to track a package this afternoon, but I couldn’t find it.” He paused. “Oh, that one? The battery was dead, so I threw it out.” “Threw it out?” “Yeah, I wasn’t using it anyway.” He looked down at his plate, avoiding my eyes. I nodded, not pressing the issue. After dinner, Lily pulled me to the balcony to look at the stars. She lay on my lap, looking up at me with her little face. “Mommy, will Daddy take us to Disney this year? He said he would last year, and the year before that too.” I looked down at my daughter’s bright, shining eyes. She was five years old. In those five years, Mark had taken “Mistress #1” through “Mistress #99” to vacation in Miami, to Japan, to the Maldives. But he had never once taken Lily and me to Disney. “We will go,” I said, stroking her head. But not with him. Lily fell asleep in my arms. Holding her, I remembered the year I retired from the military, the General asked me, “Alice, what’s your dream?” I said, “I want a home.” My phone vibrated. It was a text message from an unknown number: 【Dear Ms. Miller, I am the divorce lawyer General Thorne assigned to you.】 【Your husband, Mr. Mark Davis’s bank statements for the past three years have been retrieved.】 【There are seventy-three abnormal transactions totaling $420,000, all for personal luxury goods and hotel stays.】 【Additionally, the old house you purchased before marriage was mortgaged in March 2021. The mortgagor’s signature is Mark Davis, and your signature was forged.】 【Evidence has been secured. Awaiting your next instruction.】 I didn’t reply, I just hugged Lily a little tighter. In the living room, Mark was looking at his phone again. The screen was lit, and he was smiling. Tomorrow was Sunday. He was probably going on a date with some “mistress,” right? And I should go visit some old acquaintances. The next day, Mark woke up early. He kept checking his reflection in the hallway mirror. “I have a client dinner today for the company; I need to meet a big client,” he said, his voice cheerful. “Don’t wait for me for dinner.” I sat at the dining table and asked, “What client? You have to work on a Sunday?” “You wouldn’t understand. It’s times like these that show true sincerity.” He bent down to put on his shoes. “I might have to drink, so I might not be back tonight.” “Okay.” He paused, surprised. Before, whenever he came home late, I would always ask where he went, who he saw, and when he’d be back. By the end, he found me annoying, and I found myself pathetic. “Well, I’m leaving then?” he stood by the door. I looked up at him. “Be careful on the road,” I said. He left. I went into the bedroom and opened his closet. Deep inside, hanging there, was an old jacket he never let me touch. I felt the inner lining and found a black USB drive tucked inside. I plugged the USB drive into the computer, first sending the contents to my lawyer. Then I opened the documents. The original ninety-nine photos. Contact information for ninety-nine women. And an Excel spreadsheet. Name, age, profession, date of meeting, hotel room number, amount spent. He even had a rating system. S-tier: Long-term relationship, invest resources. A-tier: Maintain periodically, invest as needed. B-tier: Short-term experience, one-time investment. C-tier: Not recommended for repeat business. I scrolled the mouse, line by line. In the “S-tier” column, I saw a familiar name. Chloe. Note: Married, stable relationship, no burden. Her husband is deployed long-term, meets 3-4 times a month. Has been ongoing for four years. Four years. I slowly leaned back in the chair. My phone rang.

It was a message from Mr. Peterson, my lawyer: 【Ms. Miller, I have received the contents of the USB drive you provided.】 【The evidence chain regarding the marital property transfer and forged signatures is complete.】 【Additionally, your request to rejoin the military has been approved.】 【You can process your re-enlistment paperwork after May 1st.】 I looked up, gazing out the window. Downstairs, Mark’s car slowly drove out of the community. A woman was sitting in the passenger seat. I opened Lily’s room. She was still asleep, hugging her rabbit doll that was missing an ear. Mark had given it to her on her second birthday. That day, he said he had to work overtime suddenly and had it delivered by courier. I quietly closed the door. The living room TV was still on, replaying last night’s reality show. The host said, “May all lovers in the world find their happy ending.” On Monday evening, Mark returned. He carried a faint, unfamiliar perfume scent and a smudge of lipstick at the corner of his mouth. He claimed a female client was too enthusiastic during a business dinner. I didn’t expose him. But when I put his clean socks back in his closet, I quietly retrieved a second memory card from the lining of that jacket. This card contained only one video. It was filmed on June 18, 2022. In the video, he was in a hotel bed, embracing a woman in a red dress. The camera focused on the nightstand. An opened condom wrapper lay on it. The woman laughed and asked, “Aren’t you afraid your wife will find out?” He laughed. “So what if she finds out? She’s an ex-soldier, no family support, no connections. Where would she go without me?” “Besides, her scout skills were long gone, worn out in the kitchen.” I turned off my phone. His seven years of infidelity, I had collected all the evidence in just three days. The next day, Mrs. Davis said she was going back to her hometown to visit relatives and asked if I wanted to go. I said Lily had a bit of a cough, so I wouldn’t. Mark insisted on driving his mother. He eagerly carried her bags and helped her downstairs, looking like a devoted son. After they left, I took Lily to our neighbor’s house. Then I entered Mark’s study. Ten minutes later, I found a brown envelope in a hidden compartment behind his bookshelf. Inside were two insurance policies. Policyholder: Mark Davis. The first policy listed “Chloe” as the insured. The second policy listed “Leo” as the insured. The name of his four-year-old illegitimate son. Both policies were purchased on my daughter’s birthday. I picked up my phone and sent a message to Mr. Peterson: 【He bought insurance for his illegitimate son. Can this be used as evidence of bigamy?】 Mr. Peterson replied instantly: 【Yes. And in the Excel spreadsheet you provided earlier, Chloe is noted as “married.” If her husband files a lawsuit, Mark Davis could be charged with criminal interference with a military marriage. We are currently verifying her husband’s identity.】 Criminal interference with a military marriage. That alone could land him in jail for three years. I turned off my phone and stood in the center of the study, looking at our wedding photo on the wall. On Monday, Mark was sharply dressed in a suit, his leather shoes gleaming. He said the company had a meeting and he needed to meet investors, so he had to dress formally. I said okay. After he left, I changed into my old military uniform, which had been at the bottom of a trunk for three years. No insignia, no lapel pins, but the fit was still there, and so was my spirit. At ten in the morning, I stood at the entrance of the General’s office building. I was met by a young Lieutenant, about thirty years old. “Ms. Miller?” He gave a crisp military salute. “General Thorne has been waiting for you.” I followed him down a long corridor. Photographs of past Generals hung on both sides of the hallway. I paused in front of one. The man in the photo wore a General’s dress uniform, his hair completely white, his gaze piercing. “Alice,” his voice was hoarse. “You’ve grown some gray hairs.” My throat tightened, and I stood at attention, saluting. “General Thorne, sir.” He waved his hand. “Cut the formalities. Come in and sit down.” He pointed to a chair. “Tell me, how far along are things with your situation?”

I took out the evidence I had collected from my bag. He reviewed each piece, his expression growing darker with every item. He put down the last memory card and looked up at me. “Do you know what I admire most about you?” I shook my head. “Eight years ago, when you carried me for those six kilometers, you never once complained about being tired.” “I kept drifting in and out of consciousness. Every time I opened my eyes, I saw you pushing forward, rain streaming down your face, and you’d just wipe it away with the back of your hand and keep going.” He paused. “Back then, I thought, this soldier carries a mountain in her heart. She doesn’t need anyone to shelter her.” I lowered my gaze. “But General, I forgot that later.” “No, you didn’t forget,” he said, pushing the evidence back towards me. “You just put it aside for a while. Now you’ve picked it up again.” He didn’t ask about my marriage, or how I’d spent those seven years. He just picked up the phone and dialed an internal line: “Roberts, get me Peterson, my lawyer who specializes in financial cases. Also, check if there’s a family member named Chloe among the active-duty officers in our command, whose husband is deployed long-term.” He hung up and looked at me. “I’ll investigate the military marital interference aspect for you.” “As for rejoining the unit, you can finalize it after May 1st. Your old scout platoon has expanded, and they need experienced leaders.” I stood up, wanting to salute, but it didn’t feel enough. Finally, I just said, “General, thank you.” He waved his hand. “Don’t thank me. You saved yourself.” It started snowing as I walked out of the office building. I stood at the doorway, reaching out to catch a snowflake. My phone rang. It was a message from Mark. 【Honey, I won a massage chair. It’ll be delivered next week.】 【Oh, do you remember Chloe? The one who used to live downstairs from us. I heard her husband came back, and they’re going through a divorce these days.】 【I really didn’t expect such a seemingly honest woman to do something like that.】 I stared at the screen and didn’t reply. Half a month later, the court summons was delivered to Mark’s company. His face went stark white on the spot, and he knocked over his coffee. At three in the afternoon, he called me like a madman. The first call, I didn’t answer. The second, I hung up. The third, I blocked. He called again from a different number. “Alice! Are you crazy? What are you accusing me of? What did I do for you to treat me like this?” I leaned back on the sofa and spoke, one word at a time: “What did you do?” “When you bought Chloe her apartment, you used my card.” “When you took her to Japan for a vacation, you used the vacation days I earned from my military transfer.” “When you bought insurance for your illegitimate son, the insured was his name.” “In these seven years, you took four million two hundred thousand dollars from our home. All of it was our joint marital property!” Silence on the other end of the line. After a long while, his voice changed. No longer angry, no longer accusatory, but pleading: “Alice, I know I was wrong. Give me a chance; let’s talk this through properly.” “Withdraw the summons, and we’ll settle this privately. I’ll give you all the assets, the house, the cars, everything. I don’t want anything.” “Think about Lily; can you bear to let her grow up without a dad?” I scoffed. “Mark.” “Listen closely.” “Whether Lily has a dad or not isn’t up to me.” “It’s what *you* decided seven years ago when you walked out of our wedding reception to go find Mistress #1.” I hung up. Then I blocked all his numbers. At eight in the evening, Mr. Peterson sent a message: 【Chloe’s husband’s identity has been verified.】 【He is an active-duty Major in a field unit, deployed long-term, with twenty days of family leave per year.】 【He arrived in the city this afternoon and has fully entrusted us with representing him in court. The evidence for criminal interference with a military marriage is complete.】 I put my phone aside and continued reading a picture book to Lily. She snuggled in my arms, pointing at the bunny in the book. “Mommy, where did Daddy Bunny go?” I paused. “Daddy Bunny went to a place where he needs to correct his mistakes.” “Will he come back?” “No.”

🌟 Continue the story here 👉🏻 📲 Download the “NovelMaster” app 🔍 search for “413406”, and watch the full series ✨! #NovelMaster

On our final divorce cooling-off day, I called Jack—one last time. Would he really drain our assets for Karina? He picked up, but his voice was frantic, not cold. “Beth! Don’t hang up! It’s a trap! That bitch set me up!” Wind roared in the background. “Three months from now, it’s 160 degrees! The empire is melted scrap! Karina took my last cooling suit and ran!” “Beth, please! Let me into your bunker! Just one piece of ice and I’m yours for life!” Before I could speak, the villa doors opened. Jack walked in, cold air trailing him. He slammed the papers onto the table. “Enough with the phone theatrics.” “Karina needs the money for a manor to recover. Sign, and take the abandoned bunkers.” Listening to his future screams and staring at the man before me, I ended the call. “Alright. I’ll sign.” … I scribbled my name and pushed the papers back to him. Jack was visibly stunned. He probably thought my phone call earlier was just one last desperate attempt to manipulate him into staying. After all, for the past five years, I had loved him so much that I was willing to sacrifice everything for him. “You signed it?” Jack frowned, a flash of displeasure crossing his eyes. But his cold mask quickly slipped back into place. “Glad you finally know your place.” He pulled a rusty ring of keys from his pocket and tossed it onto the table. “These are the keys to the abandoned military bunker out in the west suburbs. That, plus the five million in your account, is enough for you to live on for the rest of your life.” “Beth, stay away from Karina from now on. She has a weak heart. She can’t handle the stress you cause her.” I picked up the rusty keys and let out a self-deprecating laugh. Five million? Was he treating me like a beggar? The company had over two billion in liquid assets. He had drained the entire account just to buy Karina some massive vacation estate with sprawling lawns overseas. If this were ten minutes ago, I might have cried from the heartbreak. But now, all that echoed in my head were his agonizing screams from three months in the future. “It’s a hundred and sixty degrees out here! The entire family empire is just melted scrap metal.” “That vicious bitch ran off with my last temperature-controlled suit.” What was two billion dollars anyway? Three months from now, global temperatures would skyrocket past a hundred and sixty degrees. All that money would turn into worthless ash. But this rusty ring of keys in my hand? It was going to become Noah’s Ark. “Don’t worry. I won’t bother either of you.” I gripped the keys tightly. “Jack, I hope the two of you have a long, happy life in your overseas manor.” I grabbed my purse and walked toward the door without looking back. Just as I reached the entryway, Jack’s phone rang. He answered it, and his harsh voice instantly melted into something sickeningly gentle. “Hey, Karina.” “Yeah, she signed it. That’s right, all the funds are being transferred to your name right now. We’ll fly out to look at the property next week.” The volume was loud enough that I could hear Karina’s delicate, breathy voice. “Jack, do you think Beth will be angry at me?” “Maybe we should leave a little more money for her. How is she supposed to survive without you?” “She brought this on herself,” Jack sneered, turning his head to glare at my back. “She owes you this.” Owed her? I stopped in my tracks, my fingernails digging into my palms. Did he forget how he built this empire in the first place? I was the one who stood by him when he had nothing. For five years, I worked thousands of late nights. I drank with investors until my stomach bled. I even drank myself into a hospital bed just to secure his first round of funding. We went through hell together. But a year ago, a car accident outside the office ruined everything. When the truck swerved toward us, I was the one who pushed Jack out of the way. But Karina, the new intern who hadn’t even passed her probation period, used the chaos to throw herself into Jack’s arms. She walked away with a scratched knee. But afterward, she was miraculously diagnosed with severe heart failure, supposedly caused by the “trauma of shielding someone from a deadly crash.” And Jack? Not only did he forget who actually pushed him to safety, but he slapped me across the face right outside her hospital room. “If she hadn’t tried to save me, she never would have gotten this sick! You owe her a life, Beth!” From the moment that slap landed, the five years of devotion I poured into him became a joke. Karina suddenly became his untouchable angel. And I became the ungrateful sinner who nearly got her killed. I shook my head, let out a scoff, and walked out the door. The sunlight outside was blinding. It was only May, but the temperature was already pushing a hundred and four degrees. People online had been complaining about the suffocating heat wave for days, but nobody realized it was just the prelude to a catastrophic solar storm. I got into my car and floored the gas pedal, heading straight for the west suburbs. An hour later, I pulled up to the foot of a barren mountain. This place was originally a military bunker dug out in the last century. Jack’s family bought it years ago intending to build a massive cold storage facility, but the project went bankrupt and it had been abandoned ever since. He threw it at me in the divorce settlement just to humiliate me. I waded through the tall weeds, shoved the rusty key into the heavy iron door, and wrestled with it for several minutes before it finally groaned open. The moment the door swung wide, a blast of damp, freezing air hit my face. I couldn’t help but shiver. It was over a hundred degrees outside, but inside the bunker, it couldn’t have been more than sixty. I turned on my phone’s flashlight and stepped inside. The further I walked, the more my heart raced with pure ecstasy. Because this place was massive. It was practically tailor-made to survive an extreme heat apocalypse. The main corridor was lined with two feet of reinforced concrete, buried deep within the belly of the mountain. Even if the surface temperature roasted at two hundred degrees, the bedrock would perfectly insulate the interior. Not only that, but it was already sectioned into living quarters, and there was even a natural underground river running through the back. No wonder the Jack from three months in the future was willing to trade his soul just for a spot in here. My hands shook with excitement as a dozen different plans started forming in my head. The bunker was perfect, but it was essentially a concrete shell right now. To survive the apocalypse, it needed heavy modifications and a massive stockpile of supplies. The ventilation shafts needed the highest-grade filtration systems to block the toxic heat waves that would come later. The main entrance needed a bank-vault-grade blast door to keep out the desperate, heat-crazed mobs who would inevitably try to take this place by force. But the most critical things were ice, drinking water, and thermal insulation coatings. I immediately pulled out my phone and called my broker. “Mark, I need you to liquidate my Porsche, and all the designer bags and jewelry my mother left me.” “As fast as possible. I need the cash tonight!” The broker sounded shocked. “Miss Beth, you’re going to take a massive hit selling them this fast. You’ll lose at least half their value!” “I don’t care. If the money isn’t in my account in two hours, I’m finding someone else.” I hung up and started searching for the largest ice factories and cold-chain logistics centers in the city. The five million from the divorce, plus the couple million from liquidating my assets. Seven or eight million dollars spent purely on ice and water could buy mountains of it. I dialed the owner of the biggest ice plant directly. “Is this Mr. Lee? I want to buy out your entire production of industrial ice blocks and food-grade dry ice for the next three months.” The owner thought I was insane. “All of it? Lady, that’s tens of thousands of tons of ice! What the hell are you doing?” “Building a cold storage empire.” “I’ll wire you a million-dollar deposit right now. I need the first shipment sent to the west suburb bunker tonight. And use the best thermal insulation packaging you have.” Just as I finalized the first order, my phone screen lit up. It was a text from Jack. [Beth, Karina is too soft-hearted. She’s been begging me to go easy on you.] [Here’s the deal. If you come back, kneel down, and apologize to Karina, I’ll give you a small subsidiary company to run. It’s better than rotting in that abandoned cave.] I laughed out loud, blocked his number, and deleted his contact. I didn’t waste a single second. I drove straight back to the city, pulling up to the best security engineering firm in the state. As soon as I walked into the reception area, I heard a sickeningly sweet voice drifting from the VIP lounge. “Jack, you are so good to me.” “With a lawn that big, and this top-of-the-line security system, I know I’ll recover quickly once we move into the manor.” Karina was leaning heavily against Jack’s shoulder, looking the picture of pure bliss. Jack wrapped an arm around her, his voice full of sickening devotion. “Whatever you want, baby. Money is no object.” Hearing the door open, they both turned around. The moment Jack saw me, the gentle look on his face vanished, replaced by disgust and annoyance. “Beth? Are you stalking me?” He stood up, his face hardening. “I already gave you the bunker and five million. What are you doing following me here?” Karina shrank back into his arms, acting like a frightened little bird. “Beth, please don’t be mad at Jack. If you’re really that upset, maybe we can all go to the manor together?” Watching these two put on their little show made me want to throw up the lunch I ate yesterday. I shook my head, walked right past them, and slapped a black card onto the receptionist’s desk. “Get your manager out here. I need a bank-vault-grade blast door and military-spec thermal insulation installed. And I need the work started immediately.” The receptionist took one look at the black card and scrambled to find the manager. Jack paused when he heard my request, then let out a loud, mocking laugh. “Have you completely lost your mind, Beth?” He walked over, looking at me like I was severely brain-damaged. “You took your pathetic little severance package and ran straight here to buy a vault door and insulation?” “What are you going to do? Install it on that rotting cave?” Karina covered her mouth and giggled softly. “Beth, even if you’re just doing this to get Jack’s attention, this is a bit much, isn’t it? That cave is deep underground. Spending millions to decorate it is just throwing money down the drain.” “I’m warning you one last time,” Jack said, taking a step closer. “Even if you line that filthy cave with solid gold, I will never look at you again. Take your little check and get lost. Stop embarrassing yourself.” “Embarrassing myself?” I turned my head and stared dead into his eyes. “Jack, if you’re not going to use those eyes, you should donate them to someone who actually needs them.” “I’m spending my own money. What the hell does it have to do with you?” “You—” Jack started, his face turning red, but the manager came rushing out. “Oh, Mr. Jack! Miss Beth! Please, calm down!” The manager looked at my work order and hesitated, his face twisting into an awkward grimace. “Miss Beth, we actually do have the exact equipment you’re asking for sitting in the warehouse right now.” “But the installation for a system this complex is extremely difficult. We only have one crew in the entire company capable of doing it: Foreman Chen’s team.” “The problem is, Mr. Jack just booked them.” The manager rubbed his hands nervously. “Mr. Jack wants us to install the security system for his overseas manor. Chen’s crew is scheduled to fly out next week. The earliest we could start your project would be three months from now.” Three months? Three months from now the heat apocalypse would hit. I wouldn’t need a door; I’d need a coffin. Hearing the manager’s words, the anger on Jack’s face instantly dissolved into smug triumph. He smirked. “Did you hear that, Beth? I just booked the best crew they have.” “Even if you got on your knees and begged me right now, I wouldn’t give them up.” Karina sighed, her face full of fake sympathy. “I’m so sorry, Beth. What bad timing.” Looking at their arrogant, punchable faces, I felt absolutely nothing. I turned back to the manager and asked point-blank, “Did he pay in full?” The manager froze, glancing nervously at Jack. “Well… Mr. Jack signed the contract and put down a ten percent deposit. The balance will be paid once the manor is finished. He’s one of our biggest VIPs, his credit is—” “I know how this business works. If it’s not paid in full, it’s fair game.” I cut him off completely. “How much for the blast door, the insulation, materials, and labor combined?” “Roughly six million.” “I’ll give you eight.” I pushed the black card across the desk. “Paid in full! Swipe it right now!” “My only condition is that Foreman Chen and his entire crew load up the equipment and head to the west suburb bunker tonight! The work starts immediately!” The manager’s eyes practically popped out of his skull. In this economy, contractors lived in constant fear of clients defaulting on final payments. So… “Beth, you dare try to steal my crew?!” Jack slammed his hand on the desk. “Manager! You give her that crew, and I swear to god, my family will blacklist your company from ever doing business in this city again!” The manager looked trapped, sweating bullets. “Mr. Jack, please don’t be angry.” “Company policy is very clear. Clients who pay the full amount upfront get priority scheduling. Unless… you want to pay the full ten million for the manor system right now?” “If you swipe your card for the full amount right now, the crew is yours!” Jack’s face turned the color of bruised liver. He didn’t have ten million in cash lying around right now. To buy that ridiculous vacation estate for Karina, he had emptied out every liquid asset the family had. Everything else was tied up in stocks and real estate. It would take at least a fiscal quarter to liquidate any of it. But Karina was still tugging on his arm, pouting. “Jack, she’s going too far! She’s doing this just to spite me.” “Just swipe the card! You can’t let her steal your crew!” “Shut up!” Jack furiously yanked his arm out of her grasp, looking like he wanted the floor to swallow him whole. Seeing him squirm like that almost made me laugh out loud. “What’s wrong, Mr. VIP? Didn’t you just say money was no object?” “Don’t tell me the great prince of the city’s elite can’t even scrape together ten million in cash?” As soon as the words left my mouth, the manager returned with a huge, sycophantic smile and handed my card back. “Miss Beth, consider it done! Foreman Chen’s trucks will be loaded and ready in thirty minutes. They’ll start digging tonight!” “Beth! You are going to regret this!” Jack pointed a shaking finger at me, roared in frustration, grabbed Karina by the wrist, and stormed out without looking back. … Fueled by the massive upfront cash payment, Foreman Chen’s crew worked in three shifts around the clock. It only took them a month to completely retrofit the bunker. The massive, two-foot-thick blast door was anchored directly into the bedrock. The entire facility was lined with military-grade thermal insulation. Tens of thousands of tons of industrial ice blocks, and enough food and supplies to last three lifetimes, were packed tightly into the storage sectors. And on the exact night the final shipment of supplies was unloaded into the storeroom… The extreme heat apocalypse arrived early. Without any warning, the temperature skyrocketed from the low hundreds. Society collapsed completely within a matter of days. Three months later, the surface temperature stabilized at a constant hundred and sixty degrees. The city’s power grid was completely fried. Outside, thousands of people were being roasted alive every single day. While I sat comfortably inside my bunker at a cool sixty-five degrees, lazily scooping out the center of an ice-cold watermelon. Suddenly, the proximity alarm on the blast door blared. I tapped the monitor screen and saw Jack and Karina wrestling on the scorched earth right outside. “Karina! Let go! If I take this off, I’ll cook to death!” Jack was desperately clutching the temperature-controlled suit he was wearing. Karina’s face was twisted in pure malice. She grabbed a jagged rock from the dirt and smashed it directly into the side of Jack’s head. Jack screamed in agony and collapsed to the ground, clutching his bleeding scalp. Karina ripped the temperature suit off his body and shoved her arms into it. Her eyes were full of absolute contempt. “You stupid idiot! Let me tell you the truth! That two billion dollars went straight into offshore accounts managed by me and my brother!” “That overseas manor? It never existed! I scammed you from the very beginning!” “Now that money is worthless, did you really think I was going to sit around and die with you?” She didn’t even spare Jack another glance. She turned around and sprinted into the hundred-and-sixty-degree heat wave. “Karina, come back here!” Jack reached out a desperate hand, but only grasped a fistful of boiling hot sand. The moment he lost the protective suit, the hundred-and-sixty-degree air hit him like a physical blow. Massive, agonizing blisters immediately began forming on his exposed skin. He shrieked as he dragged his body toward my blast door. He slapped his bloody, blistered hands against the reinforced steel, sobbing and wailing. “Beth! Beth, I know you’re in there!” “I was wrong! I made a mistake! It was all a trap! That vicious bitch set me up!” “The apocalypse is here! It’s a hundred and sixty degrees out here! Karina just ran off with my last temperature suit!” “Beth, let me into the bunker, please? I’m begging you, just give me a sip of ice water, and I’ll be your slave for the rest of my life!” Every single word matched the phone call from my memory, exactly as it played out three months ago. I swallowed my bite of watermelon and grabbed a paper towel to wipe my hands. Then I pressed the intercom button. “My slave?” I sneered. “Jack, do you honestly think you’re worthy of that?”

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I begged my wife for seven years, and finally, she agreed to come home with me for Christmas. My mom happily prepared the turkey, just waiting for Sarah to arrive. But by midnight, I’d called her dozens of times, and she hadn’t picked up. Just as I was starting to think something terrible had happened and was about to call the police, I saw her latest Snapchat story. “It’s been ages since I’ve been back home to see my buddies. Tonight, we party till we drop!” The picture showed her intimately embracing a man. I recognized him instantly. It was Lucas Thorne, her childhood friend she went back to see every Christmas. I remembered her throwing a tantrum for no reason a few days ago, complaining that Lucas was taking his wife and kids abroad for Christmas this year. Suddenly, I understood why she’d suddenly agreed to come home with my parents and me tonight for Christmas. A pang of pain shot through my chest, but I fought it down and commented on her story. “Didn’t you promise to come home for Christmas?” The next second, her call came in. “Lucas just got back from abroad unexpectedly, and it’s only for one day. Of course, I have to spend time with him.” Her voice trailed off, then I heard muffled kissing sounds through the receiver. A chorus of teasing laughter erupted in the background. I clutched my phone tightly and silently hung up. If she didn’t want to come home, then she shouldn’t expect to step foot in my house again.

Looking at the endless call log on my phone, I just felt ridiculous. I typed out a message to her: “Since you say this isn’t your home, let’s get a divorce.” My finger hovered over the send button for a few seconds, but I finally pressed it. Watching the message deliver, the seven years of frustration weighing on my heart suddenly lifted. The next morning, I was woken by my phone ringing. As soon as I answered, Sarah’s voice, thick with a hangover and anger, blasted through. “Leo Knight, it’s Christmas, of all days! What are you making a scene about now?” “It’s not like I did anything more than go out for a few drinks. Do you really have to bring up something as heavy as divorce on Christmas?” “I’m telling you, I’m not divorcing you. And don’t be so petty. Lucas’s wife never makes a fuss with him.” “Besides, didn’t I explain it to you last night? Lucas is only back from abroad for one day. I don’t get to see him any other time. What could we possibly be doing?” “You’re just overthinking things, I’m telling you…” I didn’t listen to her lengthy explanations, just hung up and got out of bed. Was I overthinking? Every Christmas, she’d find all sorts of excuses not to spend it with me. “Our old family home is too run-down.” “My parents want me this year.” “I absolutely have to go back and see my friends this year.” … To accommodate her, I’d gone back to her parents’ place with her every year for the holidays, leaving my own parents to celebrate alone. But every year, she’d leave me by myself at her parents’ house. She’d go out to parties alone. Claiming she was afraid I wouldn’t get along with her friends. There was even one time I waited for her until three in the morning. I kept calling and texting, but got no response. Worried something had happened, I sent her a message saying I was coming to look for her. But just as I stepped out, I ran into Lucas. He was carrying my drunken wife in his arms. “I was worried Sarah was being plied with too much alcohol, so I brought her back first.” He helped her into my arms, but she clung tightly to him, refusing to let go. He had to coax her repeatedly before she finally released him. I never imagined that the next day, she’d chew me out. “Who told you to interfere? Why were you rushing me? What kind of face did I have left in front of my friends?” “And making Lucas bring me back? Did you want him to freeze?” Now I realize that my going to look for her that night was nothing but an interruption to them, which was why she was so furious. I never thought this year she’d be so blatant. She just ditched me directly, ran into Lucas’s arms, and left my entire family waiting for her. And even made me listen to them flirting. Perhaps she’d been like this for seven years; this year, she was just too lazy to even find an excuse. A call from an unknown number pulled me out of my thoughts. I answered, and an unfamiliar woman’s voice spoke. “Are you Sarah Miller’s husband?” “Yes.” “I’m Chloe Thorne, Lucas’s wife. Let’s talk.”

“Lucas hasn’t had Christmas dinner at home a single time since we got married.” I listened to Chloe recount experiences so similar to my own. I couldn’t help but ask, “Were you planning to go abroad for Christmas this year?” “Not exactly.” She paused, then added, “But every year as Christmas approaches, Lucas buys flights abroad, only to cancel them later.” “Why?” Chloe was silent for a moment before speaking. “He claimed clients from abroad wanted to celebrate here, so he’d cancel his plans.” “So, he said his Christmas dinners were always with clients.” I suddenly remembered that every year after Christmas, Sarah would ask me to invest in certain projects. I asked Chloe what those projects were. I opened Sarah’s laptop and cross-referenced them, only to find they were all the same. “So, we’ve both been in the dark,” Chloe said calmly. “How did you find out?” I couldn’t help but be curious. She gave a faint smile. “Naturally, I looked into those projects he mentioned and found your wife’s name.” “Then, looking through his PayPal transaction history, I saw their chat messages in the memo field.” “That’s how I knew they were meeting up again this year.” “So, you called me because you’re planning…?” I idly played with my mouse, listening intently. “A partnership. We both get what we need.” “Then, it’s a pleasure doing business with you.” After hanging up, I copied all the project files from Sarah’s laptop. As I was checking for anything I might have missed, I noticed a huge file. I clicked on it, and it was full of nested folders. I tried opening them one by one, finally finding a locked file. I tried many passwords, but none worked. Just as I was about to give up and exit the folder, I noticed her laptop wallpaper. In the middle of a large heart, there was a prominent string of letters and numbers: ‘S520L’ I’d accidentally glimpsed her laptop once before, and she’d frantically covered it up. I thought she was just being shy. After all, I was foolish enough to believe this string of letters and numbers were the capitalized initials of our two names. But I never thought Lucas’s initial would also be ‘L’. I quickly typed in the password, and sure enough, it opened. I gave a bitter laugh internally. Even though I knew what would be inside, and I told myself I’d let her go, seeing her and Lucas’s records, I couldn’t stop the pain and hatred. The records were dense with details, big and small. Seven subfolders, one for each of the seven years. Though each year comprised only a few days, they took up a full 10GB. Year one: “Even though I married a man I didn’t love, I still keep the most important place in my heart for you. I’ll come back to be with you every Christmas. Love you, Lucas.” Year two: “I hate Leo’s touch. Only these few days at Christmas are when I truly feel comfortable, all thanks to Lucas.” Year three: “Leo was such a bother looking for me, forcing Lucas to take me home and wasting a night of intimacy with Lucas.” … I scrolled further and further, each entry more explicit. It felt like I was drowning in a river, unable to breathe. The last entry was from the day she abandoned me to go find Lucas alone. Sarah was celebrating. “Lucas really isn’t going abroad?!” “Good thing I found someone to cover my shift, otherwise I would have missed Lucas’s party.” “A six-hour drive is nothing, it’s all worth it for Lucas.” “No need to tell Leo, I didn’t want him to come with me anyway; he’d just get in our way.” There were also a few unmentionable selfies she’d taken. I clutched the mouse, blood draining from my face, my grip so tight I thought it would shatter. Enduring the sharp pain in my heart, I copied and backed up all the evidence. Just as I was about to grab a glass of water to compose myself, Sarah’s call came in. “Leo Knight, get in the car right now and bring my laptop over.”

I refused her without hesitation. Our old family home was over 300 miles from her parents’ place, a drive of at least six or seven hours. When I was pursuing Sarah years ago, I ignored my parents’ objections, determined to win her over even though she lived far away. So, I’d always make time and drive to see her. Whatever she needed, one call from her, and I’d drop everything to go to her. Everything revolved around her. Even if she just mentioned wanting an ice cream from the store downstairs. I’d willingly drive six hours to her place to buy it for her. Even if she took only one bite and threw it away, as long as she needed me, I had no complaints. Because I always believed that the woman who actively helped me to the hospital during my most vulnerable moment after a car accident must be kind and wonderful. From then on, I set my sights on her and pursued her relentlessly. For so many years, my kindness to her had become a habit. And she, naturally, had started taking these habits for granted as things I was supposed to do. So, she never considered how exhausted I’d be from the road, just like she’d tirelessly chase after Lucas. Through the receiver, my wife’s impatient voice came through. “Are you telling me I can’t even tell you what to do anymore?” “If you need it, you can come get it yourself,” I said, my voice flat. She exploded like a lit firecracker. “I’ll come get it? You know how far our old family home is from here, don’t you? Are you trying to kill me with exhaustion?” “Oh, so you know what exhaustion feels like? You didn’t seem tired driving to meet Lucas.” The other side fell silent for a moment, then she immediately hung up. I knew she wanted the laptop, no doubt to prepare Lucas’s contracts. It was even highly likely that Lucas was doing the contracts on her laptop. After all, Sarah rarely dealt with company projects herself; even though she was in the industry, she didn’t understand much. So it had to be Lucas handling them. I never thought that her asking me to bring her laptop home early this year would lead me to discover all this. But it was also possible she was afraid I’d discover the secrets on her laptop. That evening, my parents and I were watching a Christmas special. Sarah’s voice boomed from the doorway. She stormed in, full of anger, towards me. “Where’s my laptop? Where did you put it?” I was somewhat surprised she’d actually driven all that way back. Before I could speak, a male voice behind her piped up. “Sarah, no wonder you never want to spend Christmas here. If it were me, I wouldn’t either. It’s so primitive.” Lucas stood there with his hands in his pockets, glancing around with a look of disdain. My face instantly darkened. Our old family home wasn’t designed in a modern style; much of it retained its original, antique charm. But the furniture in the house consisted of priceless antique pieces. In Sarah’s eyes, however, they were just worthless old junk. Seeing I didn’t respond, Sarah felt embarrassed and stepped forward, tugging at my arm. “I’m talking to you! Did you hear me?” I scoffed, shaking off her hand. “Not only did I hear you, I saw you.” My eyes fixed on Lucas. Seeing the hostility in my gaze, Sarah immediately stepped in front of him. “Lucas came because he was worried about me coming back alone. He’s just here to keep me company.” “I also wanted to introduce you. He was the manager for all those projects we partnered on before. You can talk to him about investment opportunities.” I didn’t respond directly, just sat on the couch, not even raising my head. “You came back and said all that nonsense. Did you even say hello to my parents?” She froze, only then noticing my parents sitting beside me. This was only her second time meeting my parents. Sarah reluctantly turned her face, glanced at Lucas, and mumbled a “Hello, Mr. and Mrs. Knight” to my parents. My parents’ happy faces instantly stiffened. We had been married for seven years. She had only addressed my parents as “Mr. and Mrs. Knight” twice. Other times, she simply demanded money from my parents without any form of address. I scoffed, looking at her with cold eyes. “If you don’t want to call them Mom and Dad, then don’t.” She thought I was indulging her yet again, and a triumphant smile bloomed on her face. But she didn’t expect me to take the divorce papers from the cabinet and hand them to her. “They’re not your parents, and this isn’t your home. Sign them.”

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My husband cheated on me with his secretary during my pregnancy. In a fit of rage, I gathered his family and stormed the hotel room where they were staying. But during the chaotic confrontation, the secretary pushed me down the stairs, causing me to miscarry. The devastating loss plunged me into a deep, dark depression, plagued by constant thoughts of ending my own life. My husband stepped down from his executive position, dedicating every single day to taking care of me. He blacklisted the secretary from the entire industry and swore he would spend the rest of his life making it up to me. Three years passed, and I slowly began to piece my life back together. On the day of my final recovery checkup, I took his car. When I turned on the automatic GPS to navigate home, the route took me to an upscale apartment complex directly across from our estate. On the screen, the saved address was simply labeled: Home. I realized then that his home was never with me, and I was never the one he loved. 1 Not far ahead, Nicholas was gently guiding a visibly pregnant Evelyn toward the entrance of the apartment building. The tenderness on his face was identical to the expression he wore every time he coaxed me to take my medicine over the past three years. But at this moment, the illusion shattered. Every sweet word, every warm embrace, had been nothing but a carefully orchestrated lie. Numbly, I picked up my phone and dialed the number pinned at the top of my contact list. A few yards away, Nicholas paused. He freed one hand to answer the call, his voice dripping with his usual affectionate warmth. “Fiona, honey, is your checkup finished?” “I’m so sorry, sweetie. An emergency came up at the office today, so I couldn’t make it to the hospital with you.” My gaze remained locked on the rearview mirror, watching the two of them leaning in close to one another. My voice felt incredibly dry, raspy as I spoke. “Where are you?” “I’m at the office working overtime, of course. Do you want to do a video call?” He knew I wouldn’t. For three years, he had meticulously logged his daily schedule for me, even reporting what he ate for breakfast. But I had always kept a respectful distance. I didn’t want to smother him, and I didn’t want him to lose face in front of his employees. Whenever he said he was working late, I never called to disturb him. I had no idea he was using my trust to build a second life. Through the glass, I saw him lean down, pressing his nose against Evelyn’s cheek as if reassuring her not to be jealous. My voice turned ice cold. “Really? Because I think I just saw you at the gates of our neighborhood.” The color drained from Nicholas’s face instantly. He spun around, searching the surrounding street. When he couldn’t spot me, his confidence returned. “Fiona, you must have seen someone else. I’m literally in the middle of a conference room right now. My colleagues can back me up.” I cut him off. “Nicholas, do you really take me for an idiot?” I pushed the car door open and stepped out. The moment Nicholas saw me, his instinctive reaction was to pull Evelyn behind his back, shielding her from me. That single, defensive movement tore through whatever remained of my heart. Evelyn clung to his arm, her eyes wide with carefully rehearsed terror. “Mrs. Montgomery, you can scream at me all you want. But my baby is innocent. Please, don’t hurt my child. I’ll kneel and beg for your forgiveness if that’s what it takes.” She made a show of bending her knees, but before she could even lower herself, Nicholas pulled her back into his arms. His voice was thick with panic. “Evelyn, you’re pregnant!” “You have to think about the baby, even if you don’t care about your own body! I won’t let anyone touch our child!” Evelyn looked up at him, her eyes brimming with tears. “Even if that person is Fiona?” Nicholas’s response was instant and absolute. “Not even her.” Watching the theatrical display, the rage in my chest slowly subsided into a calm, hollow silence. “So this is your choice, Nicholas,” I said quietly. “Between me and this woman, you chose her.” Nicholas bit his lip, a flash of conflict crossing his eyes, but his voice remained firm. “I lost a child three years ago. I won’t lose this one. Evelyn’s baby will be protected.” “Fiona, please stop causing a scene. Once the baby is born safely, I will do whatever it takes to make this up to you.” A dry, bitter laugh escaped my lips. He still remembered the child we lost three years ago. Yet his way of honoring that loss was to cherish the woman who caused it, giving her the very family he denied me. How incredibly poetic. When I looked at him again, my eyes were as still as a stagnant pond. “Nicholas, you don’t deserve to mention that child.” 2 I returned to our house, a place I had considered my sanctuary just an hour ago. Staring at the massive wedding portrait hanging in the center of the living room, the happy, radiant smile on my face felt like a cruel joke. I took the frame down, carried it out to the garden, and lit it with a lighter. The flames slowly consumed our smiling faces, turning my love for Nicholas into a pile of black ash. My phone vibrated. I expected a text from Nicholas, but it was an unknown number. Mrs. Montgomery, your sudden appearance really gave me quite a fright. But Nicholas was so worried about me that he decided to move in with me until the baby is born. Thank you for stepping aside! My fingers trembled slightly, but the devastation I expected didn’t come. I suddenly realized that my recovery was never going to come from a bottle of pills. It was going to come from seeing Nicholas for what he truly was, and leaving him. Before I could delete the message, my mother’s call came through. “Fiona, how did the checkup go? Did the doctor say when you can stop taking those meds?” Without waiting for my answer, she hurried on. “You’ve been in such a good mood lately, so you should probably stop taking them anyway. I heard those psychiatric drugs can affect your fertility. Nicholas’s business is growing rapidly. You need to secure an heir before some other woman does. If you let someone else get ahead of you, you’ll be left with nothing but tears.” “He might say he’s not in a hurry, but what successful man doesn’t want a son to inherit his hard work?” In the three years since my miscarriage, I had brought up the idea of trying for another baby multiple times. But every single time, Nicholas had shut it down. He told me pregnancy was too hard on my body, that we needed to wait until I was fully healed. He said he couldn’t bear the thought of replacing our first child so quickly. I had believed every word. I had let myself drown in his tender care, even harboring a quiet sense of guilt. I had wondered if things would have been different if I hadn’t been so impulsive, if I hadn’t dragged his mother to that hotel room. But I had forgotten a simple truth. Nicholas was the root cause of all of it. A leopard never changes its spots. My mother was still rambling over the line, telling me that Nicholas had simply made a mistake that any man would make, urging me to let go of the past. “Mom,” I said, a faint, mocking smile touching my lips. “Nicholas is about to have a child. It’s just not with me.” Before she could speak, I disconnected the call. I scrolled through my contacts and found the number of the divorce lawyer I had consulted three years ago. “Mr. Carter, I want to proceed with the divorce. Please draft a new agreement for me.” The line was quiet for a moment. “Mrs. Montgomery, I thought you had decided to reconcile. Why the sudden change?” “My husband is having a baby,” I replied. “With the same woman from three years ago. This time, I don’t just want a divorce. I want him to leave with absolutely nothing.” After finalizing the details with the lawyer, I sent a message to my mother-in-law. Though she had dropped hints about wanting a grandchild over the years, she had generally treated me well. When she first discovered Nicholas’s affair three years ago, she had been so furious that she transferred a major portion of the family company’s shares to my name, declaring she no longer had a son. Even after I lost the baby, she had never asked for those shares back. Mom, congratulations. You are about to become a grandmother. But the mother isn’t me. I am divorcing Nicholas so they can have their family. I set my phone down just as the sound of a car entering the garage echoed through the house. 3 The moment Nicholas walked through the door, his eyes fell on the charred remains of our wedding photo on the floor. He frowned instantly. “Fiona, what is this? I just spoke with your therapist, and she said your depression was almost fully managed.” “Can we please stop with the drama? I’m only human, Fiona. I get exhausted too.” The sheer absurdity of his words nearly made me laugh. He was the one who had cheated, yet he was standing there playing the weary victim. I didn’t have the energy to argue. I turned to walk back into the house, but he caught my wrist. “Fiona, whether you believe me or not, this baby with Evelyn was an accident.” “I wanted her to terminate the pregnancy, but the doctor said her body is too weak. If she loses this child, she might never be able to conceive again.” “You’re a woman. You know what it feels like to lose a baby. Surely you can find some compassion for her, can’t you?” Hearing those words, the last of my restraint snapped. I raised my hand and delivered a sharp slap across his face. “Nicholas, I am nothing like you,” I spat, my voice shaking with disgust. “I will never show compassion to the woman who killed my child.” Nicholas had never been struck in his life. His expression darkened instantly, his jaw tightening. Before he could speak, his phone rang. He glanced at the caller ID, let go of my wrist, and stepped aside to answer it. “What do you mean, divorce? I am not getting a divorce!” “I will explain the situation to you in person, Mom. Don’t worry, I’ll talk to Fiona.” He hung up and turned back to me, his voice cold. “Fiona, do you really think that running to my mother and threatening divorce will force me to make Evelyn get an abortion?” “Once Evelyn gives birth, if you’re willing, we can raise the child as our own. If you don’t want that, I will send her and the baby abroad.” “I know this is incredibly unfair to you, and I promise I will make it up to you once this is settled.” “For now, I’m going to stay at Evelyn’s place to take care of her. You need some time to calm down.” “But rest assured, you will always be Mrs. Montgomery. You are the only woman I love.” Hearing the word love from his mouth made my stomach churn violently. I rushed into the bathroom, leaning over the toilet as my body convulsed, throwing up everything I had eaten. When I finished, Nicholas was by my side, gently helping me up with an expression of deep concern. “Fiona, what’s wrong? Is your stomach upset? Let’s go to the hospital.” I wiped my mouth, pulling away from his touch. Before I could speak, his phone began to ring. It was a unique, high-pitched ringtone. I had heard that specific tone multiple times over the past six months, sometimes during the day, but mostly in the dead of night. When I had asked him about it, he told me it was a highly important prospective client. He said securing this deal would ensure a flawless financial report for the year, and the board would finally approve his appointment as chairman. I had believed him. Every time that phone rang, I had quietly brought the device to him and left the room to give him space. But now, standing so close, I could hear the high-pitched voice coming through the receiver. It wasn’t a client. It was Evelyn. “Nicholas, my stomach hurts so much. Is something wrong with the baby?” In the next second, Nicholas shoved me aside, rushing toward the front door without a single backward glance. “Fiona, Evelyn is having an emergency. I have to go.” “If your stomach is really hurting, take some medicine. I’ll take you to the clinic once I make sure she’s okay.” He vanished through the door. He didn’t see me collapse onto the cold tiles, a sharp, white-hot pain blooming in my abdomen as a dark red stain began to spread across my clothes.

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