Marrying Nathan Hawthorne While Pregnant

: Luo Luo Is Dead

After I married Nathan Hawthorne while pregnant, he avoided me like the plague.

The day our daughter was sick, Nathan Hawthorne was celebrating his first love's daughter's birthday.

My daughter and his first love's daughter were trapped in a blazing fire!

My daughter was burned alive.

But his first love's daughter clung to Nathan Hawthorne's leg the moment she was saved.

"Daddy, I was so scared I'd never see you again!"

His first love told her not to say such things, but her eyes were filled with triumph.

1

My daughter, Lola, was dead.

She and Lena Thorne's daughter, Anya, were trapped in the fire. The man who should have been her protector—her father—saved the other little girl instead.

I numbly held Lola's body, which was burned beyond recognition, while Nathan Hawthorne stood coldly to the side.

"Daddy, I'm so scared..."

The little girl's terrified, childish voice rang out. In the corner of my eye, I saw Anya throw herself into Nathan Hawthorne's arms.

As she whimpered, Nathan Hawthorne held her and gently soothed her.

He truly looked like a loving father in that moment.

Lena Thorne shot me a glance, unable to hide the triumph in her eyes, even as she put on a show of gently scolding her daughter. "Anya, you mustn't call him that!"

Anya buried her face in Nathan Hawthorne's embrace, her muffled sobs making it impossible to tell if she was crying or trying to speak.

I had no tears left to cry.

Clutching Lola's charred remains, I stumbled out of the house.

Five years ago, someone drugged Nathan Hawthorne and sent him to my room. I had been drugged as well and was powerless to resist. After that one night, I became pregnant.

The day I received the positive pregnancy test, both our families found out. They forced Nathan Hawthorne and me to marry, threatening to kill themselves if we didn't. But after we were married, he avoided me like the plague. He didn't even show up the day Lola was born.

I had confronted him hysterically, but he just stared at me, his face a cold, emotionless mask.

"Did you really expect to find happiness in a marriage you schemed for with drugs?"

"But I was..."

"Genevieve Sinclair, you don't deserve it."

He wouldn't listen to my explanation. He never believed me.

Back when we were in school, if Lena Thorne so much as told him I'd said a single word to another male classmate, he would fly into a rage, accuse me, and then give me the silent treatment.

'But Nathan Hawthorne, Lena Thorne is your one true love. Why wouldn't you let me have anything to do with anyone else?'

'You obviously cared about me, so why did you refuse to ever like me?'

'And I was drugged that night, too.'

At some point, it had started to rain. I held Lola and walked numbly through it.

People were pointing and whispering. Their voices sounded distant, laced with a morbid excitement.

"She's the one whose daughter burned to death, right?"

"I heard she trapped her husband by getting pregnant, forcing him to break up with his first love. What goes around, comes around."

"If you ask me, homewreckers never get a happy ending..."

'I didn't. I didn't do it.'

I thought I had no tears left, but my face was still wet. I couldn't tell if it was from the rain or from my crying.

'I never wanted to break up Nathan Hawthorne and Lena Thorne.'

I tried to explain, but Nathan Hawthorne wouldn't believe me.

After marrying into the Hawthorne Family, I always did my duty. I tried my best to be a good wife and never once slacked off.

I never even cried or threw a tantrum when he and Lena Thorne were seen together in public.

I knew he didn't love me; I only hoped he would show some affection for Lola.

But when Lola was sick a short while ago, she stared at the door with innocent eyes. "Mama, Daddy will come see me this time, won't he?"

Her words felt like a knife twisting in my heart.

I called Nathan Hawthorne, only to find he was celebrating Lena Thorne's daughter's birthday.

For the first time ever, I screamed at him, telling him he must be blind to treat someone else's daughter like the apple of his eye. It was only today that I learned Anya calls him "Daddy."

'Of course. How could the daughter of a woman he loathes possibly compare to the precious child born from his one true love?'

"Stop!"

A cold bark came from behind me. Nathan Hawthorne caught up, his face grim. "Look at you, all disheveled. Haven't you caused enough of a scene?"

'At a time like this, he's worried about me embarrassing him?'

'Nathan Hawthorne, do you even have a heart?'

"Nathan Hawthorne."

I called his name softly, my gaze calm.

"You no longer have any right to tell me what to do. Not anymore."