After he came out from my prenatal checkup with me, Marvin Harding pressed two coins into my hand and told me to take the bus home.

"Charlene Henson, I can't let you bring bad luck onto Nora Galloway and her baby."

I was startled, thrown. "Who's Nora?"

His eyes slid away from mine, but he still reached slowly into the car and pulled out a photo of himself with another girl, her belly round with pregnancy.

"Five years ago, you got taken by the kidnappers because you saved me, and you were gone three months. Nora was the one who got me through all that pain."

"She's not like you. She's clean. And she doesn't even want a title. You can't really expect me to spend my whole life chained to a woman who lost her virtue, dragging around this guilt..."

My head filled with a roaring hum, my voice shaking so badly it barely held together. "What do you mean, a woman who lost her virtue?"

His tone was apologetic, innocent. "What more do you want?"

"I already married you. I'm willing to take care of you for the rest of your life. Call that my way of paying you back..."

"If you can't let go, you can always find some man on the side to make do. Just don't wrong yourself. Don't go getting knocked up by someone else and lose it again."

On the back seat were the little baby clothes we'd picked out for our child at the mall that morning.

Now they were like needle points, driving hard into the marrow of my bones.

Trembling, I crushed the checkup slip in my hand into a wad.

Five years ago, when Marvin and I had just started dating, we were seized together by kidnappers demanding ransom. I was the one who risked my life, biting through the ropes so I could get out and run for help first.

Three months later, he'd come with people and found me where I'd fled the kidnappers and hidden deep in the mountains. He'd held my hand and wept, swearing he would treat me well for the rest of his life.

But now, the same man who'd hauled me back from the cliff's edge had shoved me into hell with his own hands.

So the salvation and the true love I'd believed in were nothing but a trap he'd set, by hand, for another woman.

1.

I wanted to get away, but I caught my foot on my skirt and fell to the ground.

Marvin saw me lying there in a spread of blood, his eyes going red with distress.

"Sweetheart, are you and the baby okay?"

He lifted my still-bleeding leg with great care and blew on it gently. "Sweetheart, let me get you to the hospital and have this bandaged."

But I couldn't help laughing even as the tears fell.

How much he loved me. He could turn this tender over such a small scrape of mine.

Yet all these years, while he was behind my back getting another woman pregnant, while he was with her, he'd never once thought of me, his wife.

Marvin's sincerity had always been an act, and I'd let myself be fooled for five whole years.

I pushed his hand away and said, "I'm fine."

"You've got time for this, you should go be with your Nora instead."

But he wouldn't drop it, sweeping me up into his arms and carrying me to the hospital.

I looked at the familiar hospital. Every checkup, every blood draw, I'd been so afraid, always needing Marvin there with me.

This time I noticed he stayed fixed on his phone screen the whole while, a doting smile at the corner of his mouth.

And suddenly I let it all go.

I came out of the miscarriage room alone. The baby, more than four months along, was gone.

The doctor finished her instructions and left, and I buried myself under the blanket.

Only then did I dare to fall apart and sob.

I stroked my stomach, already flat again, and the ache would not stop.

The child I had longed for day and night, the one both our families had planned to celebrate next week and take pictures with.

Now it had become nothing but a shocking wound and pain.

I closed my eyes and forced the rest of the tears back.

Marvin loved that Nora so much, and now the two of them had their own child, their own proof of that love.

Even if my poor baby had been born, it would only have relived my tragedy.

Marvin, you deceived me with love, but now that this whole con has been exposed, I won't go on playing the fool caught in your trap.

Every bit of pain you piled onto me, I will make you taste all of it.

The ward door opened, and a figure with a swollen belly swayed her way in.

"Well, if it isn't Charlene. I heard from my Marv that he found out about how you got used by those thugs back then. I came to comfort you a little."

"Get out." My voice came out cold. "I don't need your fake kindness."

"Charlene, I'm a professional therapist. You should trust me."

Nora leaned closer, her face turning more venomous by the second. "I heard you just went and got the baby aborted. So brave of you."

I stared at her with hatred, my fingers digging a bloody scratch into the blanket. "So it really was you, Nora. Why won't you let me go? You just wanted to marry Peter, didn't you? I'm willing to let go and give you exactly what you want, so why won't you leave me alone!"

"Oh, so you know." She arched a brow and let out a scornful little laugh. "Why won't I let you go? You took my man, you even carried his child. I can't stand the sight of you, looking at you makes me sick with hate, so what if I want to get a little revenge?"

My chest heaved. "You're insane! You'll go to hell."

"Then let me tell you one more thing." She leaned in close to my ear. "You think your father was really upset to death because of you? No. Marvin knew your father loved you most of all. If he hadn't died, you'd never have given Marvin the chance to slip into your heart while you were weak. Back then, to marry you fast and win your heart, Marvin didn't hesitate for a second. With his own hands, he pulled out his benefactor's oxygen tube."

I stared at Nora, so pleased with herself, my whole body shaking, everything inside me churning.

My head filled with the moment I woke up and saw my father's face, already gone.

I had thought his final look was resentment for how I'd been careless, hadn't watched over him well enough. It turned out that was my father's last tenderness toward me.

"Go to hell!" I ripped the IV out of my arm, threw myself at Nora, and grabbed her by the throat.

But the next second, someone kicked me off the bed.

Nora crumpled into Marvin's arms, crying and sniveling. "Marv, I only came to give her some counseling. I never thought she'd suddenly try to hit me."

"Charlene, are you out of your mind! Nora's been so good to you, and you repay her like this?" He kicked me down again, just as I was pulling myself up against the bed.

I knocked over the IV stand, the glass bottle shattering across the floor, shards spattering blood over me.

"I repay her cruelly?" I pointed at Marvin, his arm around Nora. "The ones who repay cruelty are the two of you! You killed my father, lied to me all these years, and got me pregnant. It's you two bastards."

"Charlene!" Marvin roared at me in fury. "Have I been too good to you? Is that why you keep pushing your luck!"

"What does your father's death have to do with me or Nora? You brought it on yourself and upset him to death. Out of everyone getting treated at this hospital, why is it only you who raised a hand against Nora? You've got no one to blame but your own vile temper and your own loose ways!"

Marvin hated me to the core, looking at me as if he wanted to kill me. "No wonder even the media said back then, to get away you were willing to spend three months carrying on with the kidnappers. A woman as filthy and cursed as you drags down everyone around her, wherever she goes."

He wiped the bloody scratch on Nora's neck with aching tenderness, and turned his face away from me.

"You scratched Nora until she bled. Apologize."

I lifted my hand, still bleeding from where I'd torn out the IV. "Marvin, you remember this well. Back then I must have been blind to ever fall for you!"

Marvin froze for a moment, and a flicker of guilt crossed his eyes.

Nora caught that look, and jealousy spread across her face.

She cradled her belly and moaned in pain. "Marv, I'm fine. It's just that Charlene seems to have frightened the baby."

Marvin snapped back to himself at once, his expression complicated as he looked at me. "Come here. Apologize."

He spoke as if coaxing me, and as if threatening me. "Nora is carrying a child. She needs to stay in a good mood. Charlene, stop bullying her all the time. She's pitiful enough already, and now she has to be tormented and abused by a bitter, resentful woman like you. She owes you nothing."

Seeing that I didn't react, he went on. "Don't forget, I'm the one who arranged for your parents to be buried together. If you don't want them to have no peace even in death..."

I smiled bitterly, laughing at myself for how wrongly I'd given my love. I lifted my still-bleeding hand and, while Marvin stared in shock, struck it across my own face.

The sting spread through my cheek, and blood welled at the corner of my mouth.

"Enough!" Marvin roared.

"How is this enough?" I gave a soft laugh. "Still not satisfied? There's a fruit knife on the table. You could stab me a few times, let your Nora have her revenge."

"Lunatic. You're completely insane." He threw the words down, gathered Nora up, and stormed out the door.

I burst out laughing, and as I laughed, my eyes blurred with tears.

What an absurd world. He was the one who cheated first, yet in the end I was the one who'd turned into the madwoman.

Maybe to punish me for hurting Nora, Marvin shoved the door open with a bang as he left.

The doorway was full of patients coming and going, all of them curious and contemptuous.

I knew what Marvin meant by it. He knew I was afraid of those stares. He wanted me to suffer that fear and humiliation and then come crawling back to admit I was wrong.

But he didn't know. The person I loved most had already left me broken beyond repair.

I no longer cared what these strangers thought.

I got my phone back and called an old friend, one who was now a prosecutor.

There'd been a time when I was so ashamed of the hurt I was carrying that I'd cut off all contact with her.

But now, after she heard everything I told her, her voice came sobbing down the line. "None of it was your fault. I'll make every person who hurt you pay."

Tears spilled over. I hung up, and she immediately sent me a plane ticket and a divorce agreement.

"It's a flight tonight. Get away from those monsters."

I put on a face mask and made a trip to the morgue, to collect the last gift I would give Marvin.

Once everything was ready, I carried the elegant gift box home.

I printed out the divorce agreement, signed it, and set it in the living room together with my gift box.

I told the housekeeper softly, while she bustled around the kitchen, "This is my gift for Marvin. You have to make sure he opens it himself."

Seeing that I was about to leave, the housekeeper looked surprised. "Ma'am, today is your birthday. You're not coming back tonight?"

I went blank for a moment, then suddenly laughed, and as I laughed I began to cry, tears falling on the gift box.

"I'd forgotten it was even my birthday. After everything, this gift ends up being given on this day after all."

I wiped my tears and said coldly, "I'm not coming back."

From now on, I would never come back.

This place that had devoured all the happiness of my life, I would never set foot in it again.

I'd just reached the door when the executive assistant stopped me.

Discreetly, I pushed the passport deeper into my pocket.

"Mr. Finch has prepared a birthday surprise for you. Please come with me, Miss Henson."

His eyes carried mockery and disdain.

I knew he'd already been bought off by Nora. I didn't want to provoke her and Marvin at this critical moment. If they decided to torment me again, I'd miss tonight's flight.

"Let's go." I got into the car.

The car took me into a huge launch event.

I looked warily at the people filling the hall, unsure of what Marvin was really planning.

Marvin stroked my wrist tenderly. "How did you get so thin? It took me so much effort to build you back up."

I pulled my hand back coldly. "What do you actually want?"

"Still angry with me?" He touched my cheek, helpless and doting. "You were too rash that day. All I asked was for you to say sorry, and instead you disregarded your own body and insisted on slapping yourself. You scared me half to death. I had to hurry Nora away."

I pressed my lips tight and said nothing. Let him say whatever he wanted.

"Such a temper?" He tried to kiss my forehead, but I pushed him off.

A flash of impatience and irritation crossed his eyes. "That's enough now. Sulking gets boring after too many times."

"Last time you frightened Nora, and Nora doesn't even hold it against you. She's the one who offered to give you proper treatment for your psychological trauma."

"I don't need it." I looked up at the LED screen on the stage, at Nora's glamorous photos and the words Confront-Your-Shadow Method Launch — Goddess Therapist Nora Galloway Consulting Live.

Beside it ran a line of thanks: With heartfelt gratitude to Mr. Marvin Harding for his generous support of Nora's practice.

Something uneasy stirred in me, and I turned at once to leave.

"I appreciate her kindness, but I don't need it. I wish you both a happy joint launch."

"Charlene!" Marvin gripped my wrist. "What joint launch with her? This is your birthday gift from me."

"Let Nora cure your psychological trauma, and afterward you'll be just like a normal person. Isn't that good?" He grabbed my shoulders and forced me to look at him.

"Be good. Nora is the best therapist there is. She'll definitely cure you." There was actually a longing shining in his eyes. "After your father died, didn't you always want a family again? Once you're better, we'll have another child. The three of us together, isn't that the family you wanted?"

"I don't want that!" I fought against him without stopping, but his bodyguards hauled me up onto the stage.