Chapter 3

Once their figures had disappeared from sight, I turned to the doctor.

"I don't have any family to call. If there's no way to save the baby, then I don't want to keep it. Please schedule the procedure as soon as possible."

I didn't want the baby anymore.

And I no longer wanted a husband who couldn't even recognize me.

The blood continued to pour from me until the pain left me barely able to think.

I gritted my teeth and forced myself to sit up and sign the consent forms.

Before they wheeled me into the operating room, the nurse gave me a look of deep sympathy.

"You don't even have anyone here with you. That must be so hard."

"Unlike Miss Shaw earlier. She barely had a scratch, but her husband was so worried that he insisted on having her thoroughly examined from head to toe."

I managed a bitter little smile.

I'd grown all too familiar with that look of pity.

The night before my wedding, the police took me in for questioning. It wasn't until the following afternoon that I was finally released.

I made my way to the hotel, only to learn that the wedding was already over.

Since I couldn't be there, Adrian had allowed Vivian to put on my wedding dress and take my place at the altar.

It was supposed to be my wedding, yet the two of them had ended up playing the starring roles.

Even wedding photos showed them with their fingers intertwined and their bodies pressed close together.

When his friends saw the state I was in, they always tried to comfort me with sympathy.

"It's no big deal that you missed the wedding. We got plenty of pictures anyway. We can just photoshop your face over Vivi's. Then it'll look like you were there the whole time."

When my appendicitis flared up and I was left lying in the snow, the paramedics looked at me with that same pity when the ambulance finally arrived.

"You're lucky someone found you and called 911 in time. Do you have any idea how close you were to dying?"

Eight years together.

I'd put up with one injustice after another and endured more than my share of pitying looks.

At least it would all be over soon.

This time, it was my turn to forget him.

It was well past midnight by the time the procedure was over.

My lower belly felt like it was being ripped open, every movement sending a fresh stab of pain through me.

Between the blood loss and the procedure, I was so weak by the time I got home that I could barely keep my eyes open.

But when I opened the door, I found Vivian sitting on my sofa, wearing my pajamas.

Her feet were resting on Adrian's knees, and he was carefully changing her bandages, completely absorbed in what he was doing.

They looked so perfectly at ease together that anyone would have taken them for a couple who'd been together for years.

When she saw me come in, Vivian's expression flickered with panic.

She instinctively moved to stand, but Adrian held her down.

"Don't get up. Your leg's hurt this badly. Do you want to end up with a scar just because you won't sit still and let it heal?"

His face was full of concern as he spoke to her. But when he finally looked up at me, all that concern vanished, replaced by accusation.

"Elise, where have you been? Do you have any idea how worried I was about you?"

I let out a cold, mocking laugh.

"Worried about me? Is that why you brought your assistant home, put her on the sofa I picked out, dressed her in my pajamas, and sat here tending to her legs?"

Vivian looked at me, flustered and at a loss, and Adrian's expression darkened.

He frowned in annoyance, fixing me with a cold stare.

"Elise, Vivi got hurt this badly because she came up the mountain with us. What's wrong with me showing her a little concern? Why do you have to make it sound so disgusting?"

"You're the one who vanished halfway up the mountain without a word or even a phone call."

"And I was so worried about you. Honestly, you're the one with a filthy mind if you think we’re having an affair."

I was the one who'd been thrown away. I was the one who'd nearly drowned.

And somehow, he still had the nerve to accuse me of being rude and humiliating them.

Just because he had amnesia, he acted as though none of my suffering mattered, as though all the pain I'd endured was invisible.

Eight years. I'd broken down so many times that I could count.

And every single time, I'd somehow find the strength to pick up the pieces and put myself back together.