The crisp slap echoed through the hospital room.

Both of them went cold at the same time.

Adrian’s gaze darkened. “Have you had enough?”

“And isn’t this outcome exactly what you wanted?” Layla added, her voice sharp.

Layla immediately burst into tears, delicate and pitiful, the kind that looked practiced.

“Brooke, how can you say that about me?” she sobbed. “The hospital handed out the wrong medicine. How would I have known?”

“I know you’re upset because you lost the baby,” she went on, wiping her cheeks. “But you can’t just take all that anger out on me!”

Adrian yanked her behind him in one swift motion, shielding her as he glared at me.

“Brooke, that’s enough!”

“I already explained the medicine situation,” he snapped. “It has nothing to do with Layla. No matter how devastated you are, that’s not a reason to put your hands on someone.”

My nails dug into my palm. I was shaking, so angry I could barely get air into my lungs.

“I’m the one who lost the child!” I shouted, cutting him off. “I’m also the one who was rushed into surgery and nearly died! Why don’t I have the right to ask?”

Then I stared him down, every word tearing out of my throat. “Adrian, do you dare swear you have nothing to do with her? Not even a little?”

His face twisted with anger. “You’re being completely unreasonable!”

“I’m completely clean with Layla,” he said, his voice rising. “I swear it. If I ever betray you, may I get struck by lightning and die a miserable death!”

“Is that enough?” he shouted. “What else do you want from me? Say it!”

He strode toward the window, eyes blazing.

“Should I jump out of here. Would that be enough? The baby’s dead. If I die too, will you finally be happy?”

He spun back toward me, disgust written all over his face.

“Brooke, look at you right now. How are you any different from a crazy shrew?”

After that outburst, his chest heaved violently.

I couldn’t believe those words had come out of his mouth.

It felt like my heart was squeezed in a fist, then ripped open without mercy.

And then, as if he realized he’d gone too far, his voice softened, just slightly.

“Layla and I still have work to discuss,” he said. “You calm down on your own first.”

“Let the past be the past,” he added flatly. “There’s no point arguing anymore.”

Then the two of them turned and walked out of the room together.

...

My hands trembled as I pulled out the IV needle.

Then, moving as quietly as I could, I followed.

In the stairwell, they didn’t even try to hide it. Their arms wound around each other as they kissed hungrily, like they’d been starving.

Their ragged breathing didn’t stop for a long time.

Layla giggled and pouted, lightly punching his chest like a spoiled little complaint.

“You’re awful. You were so harsh just now. You scared me.”

Adrian frowned, but his hands were already holding her close.

“Didn’t I tell you not to come? Brooke’s emotions are unstable. You just had to show up. What if I couldn’t protect you?”

Layla laughed sweetly and melted into his arms, reaching up to pinch him playfully.

“Then let Brooke hit me. Worst case, no one takes care of you.”

She tilted her head, blinking up at him like she was the injured party.

“As long as you don’t feel sorry for me, that’s fine.”

He let out a low, helpless chuckle.

“You… you really are a little demon heaven-sent to torture me.”

Layla’s voice turned syrupy, intimate.

“Adrian… I missed you.”

“This time, I prepared a surprise for you,” she whispered. “You’ll have to come unwrap it yourself…”

His breathing turned heavy in an instant. Desire flashed in his eyes.

“What gift?” he asked, his voice rough.

Layla smiled, her lips curving with meaning.

“The one you want the most…”

...

Before they came back, I was already lying in bed again, pulled under the blanket like nothing had happened.

But inside, the pain of betrayal and deception swept away what little rationality I had left.

Layla didn’t come back into the room.

Adrian only tossed out a cold sentence before leaving again.

“When I’m done with work, I’ll come pick you up for discharge. Rest and recover.”

As expected, he never came back.

I handled the discharge paperwork myself and took a cab home.

That night, Adrian texted to say he had to go abroad on a three-day business trip.

Under it, there was a transfer of $500,000 labeled as compensation.

In the adult world, most anger can’t be said out loud, and most dignity can’t afford to be torn apart in public.

Numbly, I looked at the wedding photo beside the bed.

He was holding me on the beach, smiling with arrogant brilliance. It felt like the sea breeze in that picture still carried warmth.

But whatever we had, we could never go back.

Five years ago, we’d loved each other fiercely, loudly.

Back then, he chased me so openly that everyone knew.

Whenever people in our circle mentioned Adrian, they always joked with a grin:

“Adrian Fitzwilliam? Of course, we know him. He’s the Ashford family’s eldest miss’s loyal lapdog, isn’t he?”

Back then, I was still high and mighty, too proud to spare Adrian even a glance.

That didn’t change until my father’s affair was exposed, until he ripped his mask off completely and tore our family apart.

I’ll never forget that night, the hysteria that swallowed our house.

I had never seen my mother look that broken, that desperate. With a knife pressed to her own throat, she threatened my father, screaming for him to cut off the woman outside and to send away that mistress and the illegitimate child.

But all her rage, her humiliation, her wounded heart, couldn’t buy her even the smallest scrap of decency from him.

After that night, my happy family collapsed into ruins.

The next morning, my father’s cheating scandal dominated the internet’s top headlines.

My mother chose the most extreme kind of revenge.

The company’s stock price plunged day after day, until everything finally slid into bankruptcy.

She thought doing that would win the man’s heart back.

But in the end, even with two hundred billion in debt hanging over him, my father still handed her a divorce agreement.

He would rather shoulder the debt himself than live with her for another day.

In the end, the divorce papers were never signed.

My mother jumped into the sea.

My father took his mistress and their illegitimate child and fled overseas.

And I, Brooke Ashford, became a joke that everyone in our world knew.

No one wanted to come near me.

The only ones who even bothered to look my way were the spoiled rich brats I’d once humiliated.

They waved a hundred yuan in my face, offering to “buy me for a night,” jeering that the current Brooke wasn’t even as good as a nightclub hostess.

My dignity was ground into dust.

And when I was on the verge of swallowing pills to follow my mother, Adrian appeared.

He threw everything he had into pursuing me, holding nothing back, paying any price, to show the world one thing.

That Brooke was still worth it.

In a hundred days of passionate love, he spent tens of millions.

The “pocket change” I’d once looked down on became the weapon that won me a stunning reversal.

He made our wedding grand and glorious, so extravagant it shook the circle.

In front of a hall full of guests, he knelt and swore, “In this life, Brooke is my life. I’ll spend the rest of my years protecting our home.”

The dignity he’d once picked up for me had been real.

Now, he was the one who had thrown it into the mud with his own hands.

...

Truthfully, the signs of his affair with Layla had been there for a long time.

I’d seen what he looked like when he loved me.

So when he started loving someone else, how could I not feel it?

He thought he’d hidden it flawlessly.

He didn’t realize the truth was simpler than that. I was the one going along with him, lying to myself little by little.

My fingers tightened around the wedding photo frame. I lifted it, ready to smash it to the ground, when my phone suddenly rang.

A message came in from an unfamiliar number. It was a bar location pin.

It was obvious who the "host" was, and I knew exactly what I was about to face.

And still, I went.

...

Outside a private room, I paused, and then I saw Adrian inside.

The man who was supposedly on a business trip was surrounded by friends, laughing and talking as if life couldn’t get better.

In his arms was Layla, dressed in a sexy little dress, curled up against him as she belonged there.

Scandals always spread fast.

One of his friends grinned and asked loudly, “So the Ashford family’s eldest miss had a miscarriage? If that’s true, why aren’t you by her side, taking care of her? How do you still have the mood to come drink with us?”

In the past, whenever Adrian talked about me, his eyes would soften with open adoration.

But now, impatience was the only thing on his face.

“Don’t bring it up,” he said, frowning. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me lately. Every time I see Brooke, I feel awful.”

“I feel like I can’t communicate with her at all,” he went on, swirling his drink. “All it takes is one wrong sentence, and she starts suspecting me.”

“I go home to relax, not to make myself miserable. Honestly, these days, just thinking about going home makes my chest feel heavy, like there’s a rock stuck in it.”

“At this rate, if this keeps going, give it two years, and I’ll be a full-time spy!”

His friends burst out laughing.

One of them slapped the table. “You chased her as your life depended on it back then. And now you’ve changed your heart in just five years?”

Adrian leaned back, expression lazy. “Changed my heart? I wouldn’t call it that.”

After a brief pause, he said flatly, “Maybe it’s just… I’m tired of it.”

Someone else frowned, clearly confused. "They say a baby is the best thing to keep a marriage together. If you had a kid, wouldn’t all your problems disappear? So why the hell did you still insist on her miscarry?"

Adrian’s gaze slid to Layla.

“Go back first,” he told her coolly. “I’ll look for you later.”

Layla lowered her head with a shy smile, her cheeks faintly pink.

“Okay. I prepared a gift for you,” she said softly. “You have to come, alright?”

With that, she left the private room.

I slipped back into the hallway fast and pressed myself into the shadows. Only after Layla was gone did I edge up to the doorway again.

From inside, Adrian’s voice drifted out, cold and flat. “I’m still young. I don’t want kids. If there’s a kid, wouldn’t it be inconvenient to come out and have fun?”

His friend’s expression turned knowing, as everything had just clicked.

“So that’s your new favorite?" he teased. “She’s got a good body, Adrian. Looks like a good time. Bet she’s fun in bed, huh? No wonder you don’t feel like looking at Brooke anymore.”

“People are like that,” another guy laughed. “Once you’re used to steak and lobster, you can’t go back to plain home cooking. You just can’t adjust.”

Adrian lifted a brow, a faint smirk tugging at his mouth. “You should’ve said that earlier.”

His friend snorted. “Earlier? And what would that change?”

Adrian took a sip of his drink. “If you’d said it earlier…”

His friend burst out laughing, slapping the table. “Then you’d have played to your heart’s content before getting married, of course!”

“Drink, drink!” someone shouted. “Enough of this depressing stuff.”

...

I don’t even know how I left.

By the time my mind caught up, I was already standing at a street corner, soaked through to the bone.

Tiny snowflakes mixed with rain, drifting down cold and quiet, snuffing out the last bit of warmth still lingering in my chest.

In that daze, I almost saw it. A twenty-year-old Adrian is standing in front of me again, smiling the way he used to.

“Brooke, why aren’t you home again?” he asked gently. “I’ll worry.”

“Don’t be afraid. From now on, I’m your family. Between us, there are no secrets.”

Without thinking, I reached out, wanting to fall into his arms and spill everything.

My body lunged forward.

And my hands closed on nothing but air.

The figure dissolved.

A horn blared. A driver rolled down the window and cursed at me.

“Are you trying to die? Watch where you’re going! Damn it, what a nightmare!”

...

By the time I stumbled home in a trance, it was already one in the morning.

That unfamiliar number sent another message.

This time, it was a video.

The background was a hotel’s floor-to-ceiling window. Two figures were tangled together, bodies pressed tight.

In the recording, Layla’s breath came in broken gasps as she asked, her voice sticky and coaxing, “Adrian… who do you love? Look at me.”

“It’s you,” the man answered hoarsely.

“No,” she pouted. “I want to hear you say my name.”

“Layla… I love you…” Adrian growled haughtily.

“You little vixen,” he then murmured. “How do you come up with so many ways to torture me?”

Then she whispered, almost coyly, “Adrian… should I give you a baby?”

His breathing grew heavier.

“Okay,” he said. “Whatever you want. Anything.”

The video cut off abruptly.

Right after that, a single line of text popped up beneath it:

[Do you know why you only got pregnant once in five years? Because the pills Adrian gave you were birth control. I bought them myself. He wouldn’t let you get pregnant, but he’ll allow me to carry his child. You lost, Brooke.]

It was like a bucket of ice water dumped over my head, bone-deep and stabbing cold.

...

Slowly, I pushed myself up and walked into the study, one step at a time.

I took down a glass bottle from the bookshelf.

Inside were a thousand little paper stars, each one folded by his hands.

Adrian gave me that gift on our first wedding anniversary. He said I didn’t need expensive luxury goods to avoid spending money; he would only give me his sincerity.

On every star, he’d written a sentence.

He told me, “Each day we’re together, I’ll drop one star inside. When we’re old, we’ll sit in rocking chairs, open them, and relive our youth.”

I don’t know when it started, but the number of stars stopped changing.

I picked up a few at random and unfolded them.

With those words, it felt like he loved me all over again, if only for a brief moment.

[Bought Princess Brooke a necklace today. A master of national treasure-level handcrafted it, but I told her it only cost $1 million. Decades from now, when she reads this note, she’s not allowed to be mad at me.]

[Brooke said I look good in casual clothes. I’ve decided I’m wearing casual clothes to work from now on, and no employee is allowed to wear a suit.]

[My birthday came. Brooke dressed herself up as a gift and gave herself to me. I’m so happy. This is the happiest day of my life.]