Back at the hotel, I couldn't sleep. Couldn't eat.

All I could see was Constance on her knees, and her signature on that consent form.

The suffocating weight in my chest had nowhere to go. There wasn't a single person in the world I could tell about this. I kept checking my phone, expecting some kind of explanation from her. The screen stayed dark.

It wasn't until the next morning that my phone finally rang. It was the hospital, asking if I could come in and give a case lecture based on her lover's condition.

In the hospital room, Constance was carefully spooning oatmeal into James's mouth. She chatted with him between bites, telling little stories to make him smile. When I walked in, she didn't so much as flinch.

Watching them, I couldn't help but think of last month, when I'd had a high fever. I'd asked her to bring me a glass of water. She hadn't even looked up. She'd said she was worried I'd get the kids sick and sent them to her mother's house early. I'd been so delirious with fever I was talking nonsense, and she'd been out in the living room eating snacks and binge-watching TV.

It wasn't that she didn't know how to take care of someone. She just never wanted to take care of me.

Midway through my lecture, Constance set the bowl down and pressed a soft kiss to James's forehead.

Something seized in my chest. Before all of this, she had never once kissed me on her own. And whenever I tried, she'd push me away, tell me I was annoying. Say that was the only thing I ever thought about.

"What a sweet couple."

"Right? Makes you jealous."

"Though the patient's going to have a rough time. With his wife clinging to him like that, a guy with his kind of injury is definitely looking at a longer recovery."

The doctors chatted and laughed as they filed out of the room.

I turned to the attending physician. "Have the patient's family member come to my office."

Constance walked in and fixed me with a cold, distant stare. "Here to lecture me?"

"Have you forgotten what happened back then?"

Every single time we fought, she pulled out that line. It was a sword dangling over my head, and she knew exactly how deep it could cut.

It never failed her.

"Nothing to say? Cat got your tongue?" She tilted her chin up. "I thought you'd be man enough to go after James. Turns out you're just a coward."

"If you don't have the guts, then sit down and play the fool like a good little husband."

"You owe me this."

She was relentless, each word sharper than the last.

"Constance. Let's get a divorce."

"Divorce?" She stood, her gaze cutting like a blade. "In your dreams."

"You file for divorce, and I go public with what happened. I will destroy your career and your reputation."

"James needs to recover. Do your job. Figure out what kind of nutrition plan will help him heal faster."

She stared me down. "And don't look at me like that. If you'd ever had any real backbone, things between us wouldn't be the way they are now."

She dropped that last line and walked out.

Backbone?

No. What I'd had was too much love. Too much I couldn't let go of.

But the person I loved had changed a long time ago.

I'd refused to give up because I believed that one day, the Constance I fell in love with would come back. That she'd be that woman again, the one who made me lose my mind. As long as nothing crossed a fundamental line, I was willing to wait. Even if she was a block of ice, I believed that someday I could warm her.

And the truth about "that incident" was in my hands. When the time was right, I would tell her everything. I believed that when she heard it, she would understand me.

But that day never came. The right moment never arrived.

She cheated. She crossed my line.

No matter how much love was left in my heart, I couldn't accept her anymore.

Handling this as calmly as possible was already the most restraint I had in me.

When I brought up divorce today, I wasn't asking for Constance's permission. I was telling her what I was going to do.

Over the next two days, I stayed on at the hospital for the charity consultation lectures.

Seeing Constance and James flaunt their affection every single day, it only took a few days for the heartbreak to dull into numbness.

James still hadn't been discharged when my business trip ended.

I had just gotten home when a message from Constance came through.

It had been a long time since we'd communicated by phone.

She sent a photo of herself kissing James.

Once the pretense was gone, the one who was loved always grew fearless.

In the photo, she looked so tender, so devoted. The kiss was unhurried and deliberate.

My tolerance had become the currency she spent to hurt me freely.

My humility in this marriage had become the very reason she felt entitled to ignore me.

I had poured everything into this marriage, but the moment I learned about her affair, I knew I couldn't hold it together anymore.

I refused to let that old incident chain me down for the rest of my life.

I didn't reply to her message. It was time to put a period at the end of this relationship.

The truth was, my passion had been extinguished by her coldness long ago.

But for the sake of our child, I had wanted to preserve this marriage, hoping that someday she might open up to me again.

What I got instead was ruthless betrayal.

I spent three days thinking it over before I finally made up my mind.

From the moment I learned about the affair, I couldn't pretend anymore. Life under this roof would be nothing but hostility going forward.

Growing up in a home without warmth, without love, would damage our child too.

This home where I'd lived for over a decade had long since lost whatever warmth it once held.

All it gave me now was exhaustion, body and soul.

I packed in silence, erasing every trace of my existence here, piece by piece.

Then I spotted a gift box tucked deep inside the cabinet. Inside were paper lucky stars I had folded by hand when I was courting her.

Nine hundred and ninety-nine of them.

She had been overjoyed at the time, counting them every few days.

But later, they became a cheap gift that disgusted her, shoved into a corner where no one ever looked twice.

And the truth about that old incident was hidden inside those stars.

But none of that mattered anymore.

When I finished packing, I took one last look around the house.

Even though I had steeled myself to leave for good, something still ached.

But I knew she didn't love me anymore. If I kept clinging on, I'd truly become the pathetic fool she already called me.

Click.

I was about to open the door when the lock turned from the other side. Constance walked in.

She had brought James with her.

"James still hasn't fully recovered. You're the expert in this field, so you'll be responsible for taking care of him here at home until he's completely healed."

"What are you standing there for? Come give me a hand."

Constance said it as if it were the most natural thing in the world. She had brought another man into our home and expected me to take care of him.

I looked at her, long and hard, then turned and walked toward the door.

"Dr. Armstrong, what do you think would happen to your reputation if I told people my treatment didn't work?" James taunted.

I looked at him. "If you don't love her, then she deserves what's coming."

"And if you do love her, you'll end up no better than me."

I stepped past the two of them and headed for the door.

"Stop." Constance's voice was ice. "If you walk out that door, don't ever come back."

I smiled and said nothing.

There was a time when her word was law to me.

If she told me to go east, I would never go west.

But that wasn't fear. It was love.

Because I loved her, I was willing to be patient, willing to give her everything I had.

But I also wanted a love that went both ways.

"Corey Armstrong, everything you have today is because of my father. You're just going to walk away like this? How does that honor him?"

"You promised him you'd take care of me for the rest of your life."

Her father was my mentor and the hospital's chief of medicine. It was true that his guidance had propelled my rapid rise in the field.

I had always held out hope for a miracle, waiting for her to come around. Part of it was also not wanting to cause her father any grief.

But cheating was non-negotiable. It could never be forgiven.

I turned back and looked at her one last time. "I did right by him, and I did right by you. You both know that better than anyone."

"That's bullshit! If it weren't for you back then—"

I cut her off. "Constance, there's a USB drive hidden in that box of lucky stars. It has the truth about what happened."