The day Damian Thorne became a mafia boss, I took the bullet meant for his heart. A searing pain tore through my shoulder. Through the haze, I heard Damian say calmly, “Aria, I owe you for this. But I must give Seraphina a wedding.” I forced a bitter smile, handing him the divorce papers I’d already prepared. He glanced at the document, then shook his head. “You will still be my wife in name. But Seraphina will be moving in with me.” Seeing his unwavering resolve, I was too exhausted to argue anymore. He seemed to have forgotten, though. Five years ago, when we went to file our marriage papers in Ireland, he was so drunk he could only scribble his name. Our marriage was never legally binding. It could end at any moment. The blood on my shoulder kept flowing, a steady, silent leak. Damian frowned and lifted me onto the sofa. I watched him stride off to find a doctor. Then I pulled out my phone and dialed a number I hadn’t touched in years. “Caleb,” I said, my voice tight. “Does your promise from five years ago still count?” “Aria. I’ve been waiting for you to call.” I hung up just as Damian led the doctor back in. The physician cut away my blood-soaked sleeve, his face turning grim. “She needs a transfusion now. If I recall, Mrs. Thorne is RH-negative?” The nurse beside him breathed out in relief. “Thank god Mr. Thorne stockpiles rare blood at the estate. Otherwise, this would have been fatal.” But Damian explained, “That blood is reserved for Seraphina. She’s been frail since the accident.” I glanced at Seraphina, sitting in her wheelchair, encircled by bodyguards. In five years of marriage, Damian had never assigned a single guard to me. The day we returned from Ireland, he’d dropped me at an elite combat training facility instead. His message was clear. “If you want to stand beside me, you have to learn to stand on your own first.” The blood entering my veins felt like ice water, chilling me to the core. When it was over, the doctor offered his final note. “Mrs. Thorne is stable, but she requires complete rest.” Damian leaned in, taking my hand. His eyes held no warmth. “You can’t rest yet. You need to introduce Seraphina to everyone first. I won’t have her seen as my mistress. I won’t allow her to be disrespected.” Next to the matter of Seraphina Vance’s reputation, my injury seemed irrelevant. I gave a bitter, almost imperceptible smile. “Then sign the divorce papers.” Our marriage held no legal weight, but the assets we’d accumulated did. They needed to be divided. Damian’s face tightened with impatience. “Don’t be absurd, Aria. Seraphina caught a chill yesterday. She needs to rest. She can’t wait for you to be ready.” I smiled. “Fine, I’ll go.” I stood up from the sofa. “Damian, you know I’m crazy. The second I get near that bitch, I might just lose it and kill her on the spot!” With that, I turned on my heel and strode towards the crowd without looking back.
Damian froze for a moment, then quickly recovered, chasing after me. When I reached out my hand to Seraphina, Damian’s face contorted in utter panic. “Aria! Don’t you dare!” The bodyguards instantly went on high alert. But in the end, I did nothing but gently take the glass of wine from Seraphina’s hand. Turning back, I met Damian’s wary gaze, and I couldn’t help but find it amusing. He was so protective of his true love that he couldn’t even maintain his perfect composure anymore. It was the doctor beside me who worriedly advised, “Mrs. Thorne, you shouldn’t be drinking right now…” I waved him off, signaling him to stop. Then I tilted my head back, drained the wine, and smiled at everyone. “Today’s a good day. I saved my husband, and as a reward, he’s brought me a companion.” The people around us exchanged awkward glances. No one was blind; anyone could see the undisguised affection Damian had for Seraphina. “But Miss Hayes just took a bullet for Mr. Thorne!” “Well, it’s their private business. If Miss Hayes doesn’t mind, what can we say?” I ignored the whispers, smiling sweetly at Seraphina. “Seraphina, you’ll be moving into the Thorne estate from now on. You can keep me company.” I took off a bracelet Damian’s mother had given me and slipped it onto Seraphina’s wrist. “This bracelet is for you.” Seraphina’s face lit up with a flattered smile. She knew the significance of that bracelet. Damian’s expression, however, was grim. He lowered his voice. “What are you doing? Do you know what my mother’s bracelet represents?” I batted away his hand, which was trembling for some reason, and said with a smile, “What’s wrong? You told me to be generous. Aren’t I being very generous right now?” I’d drunk the wine too quickly, and it was already going to my head. I steadied myself, sidestepped a passing server, and was about to leave. Damian grabbed my hand again, his eyes swirling with an emotion I couldn’t decipher. A wave of intense fatigue washed over me. I pressed my temples and whispered, “Do I still need to play along with your charade? If not, I’m going back to my room to rest.” He opened and closed his mouth, hesitating. “You haven’t eaten all day…” How rare. He was actually showing concern for me. Before I could answer, Seraphina’s startled cry instantly pulled Damian’s attention away. “Oh! These shrimp are so hot.” Damian no longer spared me a glance, tenderly examining Seraphina’s slightly reddened fingers. “How can you be so clumsy? If you want shrimp, I’ll peel them for you.” Even though we’d been estranged for five years, Damian and I weren’t without our tender moments as a couple. Once, after I’d worked for weeks to finalize a deal for him, he’d actually carved salmon for me at the dinner table. But when I’d tentatively asked him to peel shrimp for me, his response was a cold, hard line. “I’m not a servant. Don’t push your luck.” Now, Seraphina didn’t have to do anything to receive his complete, unreserved affection. My throat felt constricted. Suddenly, the wound on my shoulder throbbed so much I could barely breathe. In the dim room, I found myself chain-smoking. “Smoking so much? Don’t you want your wound to heal?” Damian had come in unnoticed, pressing down on the hand holding my cigarette. The cigarette was pulled from my hand, replaced by a plate of steak and shrimp. The shrimp were peeled. I was a little surprised. “I peeled too many. Seraphina couldn’t finish them all. Don’t waste them.” My appetite vanished instantly. I picked up my lighter, ready to light another cigarette. “Don’t smoke. From today on, you’re going to quit with me.” Damian casually tossed the lighter into the trash can. Meeting my questioning gaze, Damian explained, “Seraphina isn’t well, I won’t let her breathe secondhand smoke.” Somehow, my eyes felt a little moist. My father was a drunk, and smoking and drinking were things I despised. But Damian was a heavy smoker, and in our first year together, I had tried to get him to quit. Each time, he’d defiantly blow smoke rings in my face. “Can’t stand it? Then get used to it.” He even went so far as to force me to smoke daily, just to get me to stop bothering him about it, until I, too, became dependent on nicotine. A notification from my phone vibrated, pulling me back to reality. I glanced down; it was my flight information. I turned my body, shielding the screen from Damian’s inquisitive gaze. He paused, a frown creasing his brow. “What’s the message?”
I dodged his hand as he reached for my phone, then looked up, gesturing towards the door. “Your little sweetheart is here.” At the doorway, Seraphina met Damian’s gaze, then meekly lowered her head. “Damian, am I interrupting? I didn’t mean to, I just… it’s raining today, and my leg hurts so much…” Her tears came quickly. “You know I can’t sleep when it rains, without you by my side.” I let out a heavy breath, suddenly understanding whose side Damian was on all those rainy nights he didn’t come home. He had brought Seraphina back as early as our first anniversary. He would never know that on rainy days, my lower abdomen would also ache faintly. That was the first rainy night he didn’t come home. On our anniversary, I waited with my pregnancy test results until past midnight, only to receive a message from his enemies saying he’d been kidnapped. No video, no pictures, not even an audio recording, yet I believed it. I rushed to the docks alone. When it came to him, I always seemed to lose all reason. By morning, he was probably just getting out of Seraphina’s bed. And I was lucky to be alive, after lying unconscious in a pool of blood for so long. Only, I’d lost the baby. A brief separation makes the heart grow fonder; rekindling old flames surely meant hours of whispered intimacies. No wonder when his men frantically urged him to the hospital to see me, he’d snapped impatiently, “Aria, your pity play won’t work on me. I was only gone for one night, there’s no need to make such a huge scene.” Good thing I never told him about the baby, or he’d have thought me even more cunning. My thoughts snapped back to the present. I walked towards the door. I had no desire to watch this loving couple get intimate. I couldn’t stand Seraphina’s feigned fragility. As I passed her, her wheelchair suddenly tipped over, and she landed on the floor with a thud. “Ah! My leg…” “Seraphina!” Damian rushed out to help her, bumping into my shoulder as he sidestepped. That slight force alone shouldn’t have made me fall, but the bullet wound on my shoulder seemed to tear open again. The pain was excruciating. My vision blurred, and I collapsed to my knees. Damian, however, thought I was still trying something. He protectively pulled Seraphina to the other side and sharply reprimanded me. “What else are you trying to do?” Unjustly accused, I said coldly, “I didn’t push her. There are security cameras in the hallway, aren’t there? Go check them.” Seraphina sobbed uncontrollably. “Damian, let it go. She probably didn’t mean it. It’s my fault for not getting out of her way…” Damian patted her shoulder soothingly, a frown on his face. “Is there really a need to check? If you say it wasn’t you, then did Seraphina push herself over? Her leg can’t move.” Her leg can move! I saw it clearly just now. My throat was dry and sore, but the words caught in my mouth and I swallowed them back down. I was leaving anyway. There was no need to say things he’d never believe. “My leg… Damian, my leg hurts so bad…” Damian, oblivious to everything else, hastily scooped Seraphina into his arms. Before he left, he shot me a cold glare. “Today’s incident won’t be forgotten so easily.” It was the housekeeper who noticed the blood still oozing from my shoulder and rushed to take me to the hospital. Before the car even reached the hospital, I received a call. “Miss Hayes, your father’s condition is unstable. He’s threatening to kill himself if he doesn’t see you!” Suicide? No, that wouldn’t do. I still wanted him to live a life worse than death. I rubbed my temples, irritated, and told the driver to turn towards the sanatorium. At the sanatorium, the moment my bastard father saw me, his cloudy eyes suddenly cleared. “Aria, you finally came to see me. I know I was wrong. Will you forgive me? Your mother…” “Shut up!” I couldn’t hold back anymore and lunged forward, grabbing his throat. He had no right to mention my mother. Reason returned, and I disgusted, loosened my grip on his neck. In that instant, a small knife appeared in his hand, and he suddenly lunged, aiming for my throat. “Aria Hayes, die! Just die!” I raised my arm to block him, and the wound stretched from my wrist straight up to my elbow. A sedative shot, and the man on the bed gradually became still. My hand wouldn’t stop trembling. The caregiver thought it was from pain and frantically tried to pull me away to bandage the wound. It wasn’t until she couldn’t move me at all that she followed my gaze to the small knife on the floor. It was the knife I had given Damian for protection. I let out a scoff. Sure enough, the closer people were, the better they knew where to stab to hurt the most.
“Why are you still stubbornly clinging on? Damian said he doesn’t want to see you again.” With Damian gone, Seraphina had no need to act frail around me. I was busy packing my luggage, with no time to deal with her, but I glanced at her empty wrist and casually asked, “Where’s the diamond bracelet? Why aren’t you wearing it?” She was so eager to join the Thorne family; it didn’t make sense for her not to wear the bracelet symbolizing the Thorne family matriarch’s position. Seraphina’s smile froze, then she said viciously, “You’re doing this on purpose, aren’t you?” “Didn’t you use some shady tactics to threaten Damian into taking the ring back? And now you’re deliberately bringing it up to gross me out. You’re clearly not that generous.” She sneered, lifting her chin. “But what does it matter if I have that bracelet or not? The only one who can truly get into Damian’s heart is me!” I frowned. Damian took it back? I shook my head, not wanting to guess Damian’s thoughts anymore, and ignoring Seraphina’s provocation. Lost in packing my luggage, I didn’t notice the sudden vicious glint in Seraphina’s eyes. A commotion erupted in the mansion. By the time I realized something was wrong, a tranquilizer dart hit the back of my neck. Before my vision blurred, I saw the face of one of Damian Thorne’s enemies. I woke up to a swaying motion, on a boat. Seraphina had woken up earlier than me and was tremblingly demanding, “Just grab her! Why did you grab me too?” Sure enough, she had dismissed the bodyguards around the mansion and let these people in. The man only sneered at Seraphina’s naive plea and turned to answer Damian’s call. Damian’s voice came through, rough with strain. “Your father is free. Now let them both go.” “There’s no such thing as two for one, is there? Two women, you can only choose one.” After a long silence, Damian still didn’t make a choice. Seraphina grew anxious. “Damian, save me! My leg can’t move. Aria can escape on her own. I can’t do this without you…” I stayed silent, my sharp eyes noticing that Damian’s men seemed to have already infiltrated the boat. The next second, the boat’s power was cut, and the entire vessel plunged into the boundless darkness of the sea. Then, gunshots, dull thuds, and the sound of bodies falling followed in quick succession. In mere moments, control changed hands. The leader, shot in the abdomen, let out a strange laugh. “Damian, you truly are treacherous. But you never expected this, did you? There’s a bomb on board, and I’m taking both your women down with me!” To approach unnoticed, the rescue boat Damian had dispatched was small, clearly only able to save one person. Damian’s breathing grew heavier. He roared, “Save Seraphina first!” The cold wind made my eyes ache. I heard Damian continue, “Aria, you know how to stop the bomb, right? I taught you.” “Go on!” I stared blankly at the device, its red numbers flashing down. Thirty, twenty-nine, twenty-eight… “Damian,” I said, my voice barely a whisper, “I truly regret ever loving you.” On the other end, Damian heard every word. “Aria…please…I’m begging you, don’t” His voice was almost shock. “Mr. Thorne,” a voice crackled in his earpiece. “Seraphina and I are secure.” At that exact moment, a massive fireball tore across the surface of the sea.
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