On our wedding night, Jackson Simmons was called away by an urgent work call. He didn't come back until noon the next day.

He looked at the food I'd reheated over and over, then collapsed onto the couch, his voice worn thin.

'Camila Stewart, that wasn't a work call last night. It was your stepsister.'

'I was with her the whole night. She's a lot better in bed than you are. We had a wonderful time.'

My hand jerked.

The soup I'd just ladled from the clay pot spilled all over.

In an instant it scalded the skin off the top of my foot, and yet I felt no pain at all.

I stood frozen where I was, staring hard at Jackson.

Something about last night seemed to please him, a flicker of it dancing between his brows.

He lit a cigarette without a second thought and went on,

'Three years ago, those photos of you being violated.'

'I'm the one who had them posted online.'

He stretched and sank deeper into the couch, ash scattering onto the rug I'd just cleaned.

Beneath the lifted hem of his shirt, I saw the kiss marks covering his waist.

Noticing my gaze,

Jackson raised his eyebrows high and smiled at me.

'Actually, the man who violated you—I was the one who hired him, too.'

——

For a moment the world spun.

Three years ago, on the night of my birthday, I was dragged out of the restroom by criminals,

tormented at their mercy for three days and three nights,

and three hours after I was rescued,

those unspeakable photos were spread all over the internet.

The pain of skin flayed open by a whip,

the hatred of being exposed online, of strangers pointing at me and calling me a 'slut,'

stripped away my courage to keep living.

It was Jackson who dragged me, by sheer force, up out of that darkness.

Night after night I drank myself into a stupor,

and Jackson worked a full day, then stayed with me through every single night.

He pushed himself so hard that he collapsed right there in his office from exhaustion.

I overdosed on my medication,

and right after, Jackson deliberately drank until he gave himself a perforated stomach.

To this day, he still can't touch anything cold.

The time I broke down worst of all, I climbed to the roof.

Jackson stood up there with me and said that if I didn't want to live, then he would have to die before me,

so he could go on ahead and get our new home ready.

The moment he finished speaking, Jackson threw himself off.

He slammed down hard onto the emergency airbag, every bone in his body shattered.

I kept watch outside the ICU for seven days and seven nights, and after he was discharged, I said yes to his proposal.

All this time I had thought of Jackson as the redemption of my life,

but he had just said,

that on our wedding night, he'd gone to be another woman's groom.

That the thing that had driven me to the edge of the abyss, he was the one who did it.

'Wh… why?'

Barefoot, treading over the porcelain shattered across the floor, I walked slowly toward Jackson.

Bright red blood, mixed with greasy soup, left a streak of crimson across the spotless white tiles,

and yet I felt no pain at all.

'Jackson, why?!'

'Why would you do this to me?!'

Every word was like a thorn born in my blood,

piercing through my veins, tearing through my flesh, screaming out from inside my chest.

It hurt so much.

Jackson slowly sat up on the couch.

As he straightened his clothes, he caught sight of the long streak of blood behind me.

His brow tightened.

He crushed out the half-smoked cigarette in the ashtray,

reached into the first drawer on the left side of the coffee table with practiced ease and took out iodine and cotton swabs.

He came over and gripped my ankle, his tone flat but with a thread of tenderness running through it.

'You're bleeding. Let me take care of it.'

Watching Jackson kneel there in front of me, tearing open the swab packaging like it was second nature,

I couldn't hold back the tears any longer.

They fell in heavy drops, splashing onto Jackson's shoulder.

The sight of him throwing himself off that rooftop and the words he'd just spoken tangled together in my mind.

I wrenched hard, pulling my ankle free of his grip.

The force sent the top of my foot dragging across a broken porcelain shard on the floor.

It opened a long gash, blood trickling out, but I was past caring.

I stared at him through blood-red eyes, watching his calm face as my voice trembled.

"Answer me!"

"Why would you do this to me!"

Jackson spread his hands, glanced at the blood still dripping from my foot, lit another cigarette, and let out a long breath.

"Because I hate you."

Hate me?

We'd known each other since we were children, and in all our time together we'd rarely even had a cross word.

Three years ago, when his mother needed a heart transplant, I was the one who scraped together every last dollar.

He'd done nothing but hurt me.

I hadn't even had the chance to hate him yet. What right did he have to hate me?

The questions piled up in my throat.

I was about to speak when Jackson's phone rang.

He glanced at the number and answered in a rush.

After a few gentle murmurs into the phone, he turned to look at me.

"Your stepsister misses me. I have to go be with her."

"She's pregnant. The child is mine."

"Tidy up the house. In a few days I'll bring her home, and you'll look after her."

Jackson said it all as easily as if he were talking about the weather.

Perfectly calm, he picked up his car keys, got dressed, and turned to leave.

As the door was closing,

his gaze settled on my blood-soaked foot.

"Deal with that yourself."

"The cotton swabs are in the first drawer of the coffee table. The first-aid kit is in the first cabinet on the left just inside the walk-in closet."

With that, he shut the door and was gone.

Ever since what happened to me three years ago, I couldn't stand loud noises.

Every time Jackson left, he always closed the door softly.

Even just now was no exception.

But that gesture, the one that had warmed me countless times before,

now only made me sick.

The moment the door clicked shut, I clutched my stomach and gagged, a dry heave tearing out of me.

And even once I'd calmed down, I still couldn't understand

where this hatred could possibly have come from...

That night, Jackson came home reeking of liquor.

He swept a glance over the empty dining table

and tossed out a single line.

"I'm hungry. Fix me something to eat."

Then he went straight into the bathroom.

Half an hour later,

Jackson came out wrapped in a towel.

His entire upper body was covered in kiss marks.

Old ones layered over new ones, red and vivid, packed close together, and my stomach began to twist again.

Drying his hair, he walked to the dining room.

Seeing the table still empty, his voice went cold.

"Camila, I just told you to fix me something to eat. Didn't you hear me?"

I didn't answer him.

I walked slowly to stand behind him, staring coldly at the kiss marks covering his back.

"What right do you have to hate me?"

"I've never done anything to wrong you."

Jackson went rigid for an instant.

When he turned to face me again, a vast contempt flickered through his pitch-black eyes.

He smiled, a smile full of mockery.

"Camila, you actually have the nerve to say that..."

Under my thoroughly bewildered gaze,

Jackson took out a voice recorder.

The next second, my own voice came drifting slowly out of it.

‘I swear I never loved Jackson, and I never will. Thaddeus Winfield, you're the only one in my heart.’

The moment I heard my own voice,

every drop of blood in me turned to ice.

‘This... this recording, how did you get it...?!’

My voice shook.

Jackson stared at me, smiling like a man who'd lost his mind.

‘Camila, so this is the thing you swore you never did to me?!’

‘On the SATs, I turned in a blank answer sheet for one whole section, just so I'd end up at the same college as you.’

‘After we started working, that sicko boss of yours tried to take advantage of you, and I beat him into the hospital to get even for you. I got locked up a month over it, and lost the best job offer I ever had.’

‘Eight years together, I handed you every paycheck, just so I could earn faster and give you a home.’

‘And it turns out you never loved me?! It was my best friend in your heart the whole time?! Well done. Really.’

Jackson's eyes were bloodshot, his chest heaving with rage.

‘But I'm pathetic. I can't stop loving you!’

‘I couldn't help it! All I could do was marry you! And then do everything I could to grind you down! Only that way could I feel a little better!’

‘Camila, what you owe me, you'll spend your whole life paying back!’

‘For the rest of your life, I want you to taste that heartbreak every single day!’

I stumbled backward, unable to get out a single word.

Three years ago, Jackson's mother had been critically ill and needed a heart transplant right away.

A matching donor heart was found,

but even after we emptied every last dollar of our savings, we were still five hundred thousand dollars short.

At the worst of it, Jackson's best friend, Thaddeus, came to me.

He slapped a bank card down in front of me,

looked at me, one corner of his mouth curling into a strange smile.

‘Camila, I've been in love with you for four years, and you wouldn't so much as give me a second glance.’

‘Today, all you have to do is admit it to my face, that you don't love Jackson and never will, and say you love me, and this five hundred thousand is yours.’

‘Not only that, I'll make sure Jackson's mother gets the best treatment there is.’

‘But one condition. No third person can ever know about this.’

One sentence, one life.

I said it without a moment's thought.

Never in my wildest dreams did I imagine

that every gift fate hands you comes with a hidden price tag,

and whatever you came up short on before,

you always have to pay back in the end.

‘Camila, explain yourself!’

Faced with Jackson's demand, I couldn't force out a single word.

His mother was still in the hospital, receiving the best treatment plan Thaddeus had paid for...

‘Heh...’

A bitter laugh escaped Jackson as he turned and walked away, despair filling his eyes.

He'd just reached the living room when the front door was pushed open from outside.

My stepsister stood in the doorway, dragging a suitcase, her belly swollen large.

Stepsister, I called her,

but enemy would be the more accurate word.

Ten years ago, Naomi Stewart's mother took up with my father,

and just like today,

she showed up outside our door, leading Naomi by the hand.

On that pouring-rain day, my mother ran out of the house in heartbroken pieces, and a truck bore straight down on her and shattered her to nothing. She died on the spot.

Looking at Naomi's brows and eyes, the very image of that woman's,

I felt as if a huge hand had lifted my heart and clenched it tight.

‘What are you standing there for?’

Jackson's cold voice sounded behind me.

‘Help your sister bring her things inside.’

Jackson shoved me toward the door.

When I still wouldn't step forward, he spoke, soft and low.

‘Camila, take good care of Naomi. Help her raise the child.’