A photo of him receiving an IV drip at the hospital, captioned: [Veronica, don’t worry about me. It’s my fault.]

A selfie in front of the university teaching building, captioned: [Youth that can’t be returned, people I can’t forget.]

I forwarded the screenshots directly to Veronica.

She dialed Yohan’s number and roared into the phone, “Yohan, I’m warning you to stay away from William or don’t blame me for not showing any mercy.”

A tearful voice came from the other end of the line, “But Veronica, I’ve loved you for eight years. I can’t live without you.”

Veronica hung up, her face darkening.

The next day, Yohan’s public warning was posted on the institute’s bulletin board. His eligibility for professional title evaluation was revoked and he was transferred away from the core project.

I knew this was Veronica’s doing. She wanted to use this method to demonstrate her resolve toward me.

But that very afternoon, Yohan burst into my office, weeping.

“William! Are you satisfied? Not only did you use marriage to blackmail my senior, now you’re ruining my career!”

He lunged at me. I slapped him across the face.

“You seduced a married woman, destroyed someone’s family and you still have the nerve to argue with me?”

Veronica rushed over, shielding me in her arms as she glared coldly at Yohan. But he grew bolder and lunged forward.

He lightly kissed Veronica’s lips. My mind went blank.

Then I heard him say, “Veronica, I’m the famous campus heartthrob. So many people are after me, I don’t believe you have no feelings for me at all!”

Just as I was about to slap him again, Veronica stopped me.

After a few stunned seconds, she finally spoke, her voice tight.

“You don’t deserve me.”

“William has been with me from nothing to something for so many years, I won’t betray him.”

Then she grabbed the pen holder and hurled it at him.

Yohan didn’t dodge. He stood silent, letting blood trickle down his temple.

“This is the price you pay for messing with William.”

She dropped the cold warning, then pulled me out of the office. But the moment we stepped outside, Veronica instantly let go of me.

Turning her back to me, she lit a cigarette.

“William, you go back first. I’ll be working overtime at the hospital later.”

My words caught in my throat.

Finally, I managed only a strained, “Mm, okay.”

That night, Veronica closed her eyes and straddled me willingly.

After it ended, she murmured in her sleep, “Yohan.”

My body stiffened and I wrenched myself free from her embrace. I looked at the woman whose beauty hadn’t faded in ten years.

I recalled how she stood up for me when I was bullied, her forehead stitched with thirty-three stitches. I remembered how she risked half her life to save me on the snowy mountain.

I remembered how, at my single mention of feeling unwell, she abandoned an international conference, flew halfway across the globe and cooked me nourishing soup.

Veronica’s kindness was etched vividly in my memory. Yet now, she herself remained unaware that her heart no longer belonged to me.

I stared at the ceiling until dawn. Then I sent a message to the president of the National Academy of Sciences.

[Ms. Barkworth, I accept your invitation. I will join the Sky Dome Project team in one month.]

After that day, Veronica and I shared an unspoken understanding. Our daily interactions gradually decreased.

Until the academy held its annual commendation ceremony.

Veronica and I were invited onstage as the “Model Researcher Couple.” Everyone praised us as a perfect match made in heaven.

Suddenly, a young woman rushed onto the stage and slapped Veronica across the face.

“Veronica! You two-faced bitch! If you don’t love Yohan, why give her hope?”

All eyes in the room turned toward us.

It seemed the woman was a fanatical admirer of Yohan.

She let out a cold laugh, her eyes brimming with contempt.

“Remember that lab fire? He burned half his leg trying to save you and he still has the scar!”

Yohan rolled up his pant leg, revealing the startling scar.

Veronica, standing beside him, gasped for breath.

“That award-winning project of yours? He kept it from you, working tirelessly for a month before submitting the final version.”

“That so-called academic title? He begged and groveled countless times to secure it for you.”

“Veronica, your achievements today are not due to you and your husband, it’s down to Yohan!”

The room erupted in shock.

I broke the silence, speaking calmly, “But all he did was act on his own delusions. Veronica never asked him to do any of this.”

“If Yohan uses this to blackmail me, he’s destroying our family and trying to become the mistress who takes my place!”

The woman was indignant and about to speak again, but Yohan pulled her back, tears streaming down his face.

“Veronica, please stop! William is right, I shouldn’t harbor immoral fantasies about you!”

“It was all my own choice. I love someone without expecting anything in return.”

The woman was almost crying. “Yohan, you’re too selfless. It’s not worth it for someone like Veronica.”

Only then did Veronica speak slowly, “William is right and he is my only husband. He was in the past, he is now and he will be forever.”

“Please leave. Stop spreading false accusations here.”

Her voice was firm. Yet I could sense her fingertips trembling slightly. She looked at Yohan with a hint of confusion.

My heart felt as if a needle had pricked it. Even though I’d already decided to leave, it still hurt.

Just then, the crystal chandelier overhead suddenly made a strange noise and crashed straight down toward us.

Screams erupted and I instinctively closed my eyes.

Veronica, beside me, used all her strength to shove me in the opposite direction. But she darted forward like an arrow, rushing toward Yohan.

“Bang!”

The chandelier smashed to pieces beside me, shards of glass slicing my arm and cheek. Through the pain, I could still see faintly in the distance.

Veronica had shielded Yohan fiercely beneath her body. The main frame of the chandelier crashed down on her back. Yohan was still in shock.

But voices spoke nearby, “Mr. Larrison only has a grazed knee. Ms. Gerosa, did you really need all those resources to save him?”

“Your husband is bleeding heavily! If he doesn’t get treatment soon, he could die!”

Before losing consciousness, I saw Veronica carry Yohan away, disappearing from my sight.

When I opened my eyes again, I was lying in a hospital bed.

The nurses whispered gossip outside the door.

“Did you hear? Ms. Gerosa fractured her back trying to save Mr. Larrison!”

“That’s right! She wasn’t even fully recovered herself, yet she was rushing to apply medicine and feed Mr. Larrison soup. Her own husband didn’t get that kind of treatment!”

“Tsk. She and Mr. Larrison are true love, aren’t they? A perfect match that’s the kind of chemistry that makes a couple.”

It was a long time before Veronica finally came to my hospital room. She held a half-bowl of soup, intending to feed it to me.

I threw it to the floor. “I don’t want leftovers from someone else.”

Hearing this, her face filled with guilt. “William, I’m sorry. Yohan saved my life first, so I repaid her with mine. It’s a common thing as human beings.”

“But I promise, this will never happen again.”

His life mattered were precious, but how about me?

I didn’t argue with her. Instead, I threw the document at her. “Sign this.”

Without even glancing at it, she signed her name and I smiled. If she had just opened one page, she would have known it was a divorce agreement.

After signing, Veronica said she wanted to make it up to me and take me to Paris for a break.

But as soon as we arrived at the airport, her phone rang. It was Yohan.

On the other end, he was sobbing, gasping for breath, saying he was scared alone in the hospital.

Veronica hung up. Her eyes glanced elsewhere, looking worried.

“William, there’s an urgent project at the institute. I have to go back. You go ahead, I’ll meet you at the airport as soon as I’m done.”

But I waited from daylight until night and Veronica never showed up. Instead, Yohan updated his social media.

In the photo, his hand was intertwined with a woman’s and the woman’s wrist was tied with the red string I had gotten for her.

The photo with the caption: [My beloved accepted my confession. Eight years of deep affection have finally culminated in marriage.]

I liked the post. Just then, Veronica called me, but I didn’t answer.

It got dark and a light rain began to fall outside. I suddenly felt a little tired and wanted to go back to my old home.

My father opened the door for me. Seeing me, he didn’t say anything, only poured me a bowl of hot soup.

When I had almost finished the bowl, he suddenly said, “Once a woman’s heart changes,you can’t keep her again.”

My hand holding the bowl froze.

“Just like your mother, she fell in love with Uncle Simon back then.”

“No matter how much I said, or how much I tried to win her back, she still ran off with another man without hesitation.”

I fell silent, remembering my childhood stories with Veronica.

After listening, she nestled in my arms, crying and promised, “Don’t worry, William. I’ll never betray you.”

Yet here we were and she broke her promise. This tragedy repeats itself.

My father gripped my hand. His eyes filled with tears.

“If you want a divorce, I will support you. I’ll always be your supporter.”

I couldn’t hold back any longer. My tears rolled down my cheeks and into my soup.

It dawned on me that in this world, there was someone who loved me unconditionally.

But in the middle of the night, my father suffered a heart attack and was rushed to the hospital.

The doctor issued a critical condition notice, saying he needed an immediate injection of a ‘special drug’ immediately or he wouldn’t survive the night.

This “special drug” was exclusively produced by the research institute and only Veronica possessed it.

I frantically called Veronica, but no one answered.

I rushed to the research institute and entered her office.

There, I found Veronica cradling a Samoyed that was convulsing violently. Yohan sat beside her, his eyes red from crying.

“Veronica, Snowball is dying. Please, save him!”

Veronica froze when she saw me.

I grabbed her arm, my voice trembling, “Veronica, my father’s having a heart attack! He’s critically ill! Give me that ‘miracle drug’ now!”

At that moment, Yohan beside us was also full of tears.

“Veronica, I’m sorry. Snowball ate something contaminated, triggering acute myocarditis. The vet said only the ‘miracle drug’ can save him. It’s been with me for five years, I can’t live without Snowball.”

Veronica looked at the dying dog in her arms, then at me, her face filled with struggle.

I knelt down, begging at her feet for the first time in my life. “Veronica, I’m begging you! that’s my father who has been my only family for twenty years, the only person I have left in the world!”