In my seventh year working the red-light district, I ran into Alex Harding.

He'd become Harbor City's uncrowned king—untouchable.

Successful, famous, and desperate to scrub his image clean.

I was the stain he needed gone.

Neon light carved shadows across his face as he looked down at me.

"Josephine Simmons." His voice was ice. "After all these years—any regrets?"

Something churned behind his eyes. Love. Hate. Seven years of both, tangled together.

Like if I just bent my head a little, time might fold back on itself. Back to when we were happy.

I smiled.

"Never."

I'd made my choice that night seven years ago. If heaven gave me a hundred do-overs, a thousand—I'd choose the same thing every time.

Even knowing I'd face every storm alone.

——

Mongkok Tower was Harbor City's most notorious slum. A place for people who couldn't survive in the light.

I'd hidden here to stay as far from Alex Harding as possible.

Seven years of running in circles, and I still crashed right into him.

In the most humiliating way imaginable.

Alex had brought investors to inspect the site. They were discussing demolishing Mongkok Tower, replacing it with some gleaming commercial high-rise.

I was chasing down a customer who owed me five hundred bucks. Wasn't watching where I was going.

Fell right at Alex Harding's feet.

Our eyes met.

His flashed with shock. Disgust. And something else—a flicker of pain he didn't even seem to notice—gone in an instant.

Then his face went cold. He stared down at me like I was garbage.

"Josephine Simmons. You left me no matter what I said."

A pause.

"So this is the life you wanted."

One of his lackeys caught the contempt in Alex's voice and piled on. He crouched down, making a show of wiping the shoe I'd dirtied.

"Well, well! Mongkok's number one flower herself!" His voice rang out for everyone to hear. "Back when Alex hit rock bottom, you cleaned out his savings and ran off with some pretty boy."

He clicked his tongue. "Seven years and look at you now. Where's your man? Just letting you sell yourself on the street?"

A snort. "Figures. A pretty boy—what else would he be good for? You thought every man would be like Alex? Guy used to sell his own blood just to feed you—"

He kept going, righteous and loud.

Completely missing how Alex's expression had shifted behind him.

These past years, Alex's rise had been meteoric. He'd inherited the Harding family empire and clawed his way higher through sheer ruthlessness. The kind of desperate, nothing-to-lose drive that scared even his rivals.

Now he stood at the peak.

Happy. Successful. A golden future stretching ahead.

Why would he want to remember that miserable past? The one that belonged only to me.

But our history wasn't exactly secret. The other executives noticed Alex's darkening mood and scrambled to change the subject.

They brought up his fiancée—Lola Pruitt.

Reminded him there was no point getting worked up over trash like me.

The flattery seemed to work. Alex's jaw unclenched. He stepped past me without another glance.

But at the end of the hall, he stopped.

Turned.

"Josephine."

His voice was quiet now. Almost raw.

"Why?"

The others looked confused.

But I knew exactly what he was asking.

Why did I leave without saying goodbye back then?

Why did I choose that kind of person?

Why, after ending up like this, was I still unwilling to bow my head to him?

I looked at the coldness in Alex's eyes—the kind he couldn't let go of.

I chuckled softly and gave the same answer as seven years ago.

"Because of love."

I love Alex Harding.

From the moment I first came to Harbor City, when he rescued me from the red-light district, I had already fallen in love with him.

I remember that day. The evening breeze brushed my face, and the sky blazed with rosy clouds. Alex lifted me onto his motorcycle and told me to hold his waist and not be afraid.

"Remember this—your boy here is the boss of this area. From now on, stick with me, and you won't have to be afraid of anything."

What boss—Alex was a big liar.

All his belongings added up to one dumb little sidekick who couldn't read the room, and a beat-up motorcycle that had been patched together more times than I could count.

But we made it. Day by day, we endured, relying on that motorcycle.

Using the skills I'd learned on the mainland, I opened a flower shop. Alex drove that beat-up motorcycle to make deliveries.

On the day we made it official, we agreed to save up money and take over a storefront. When the shop opened, we would get married.

Alex was so happy he almost didn't know where he was. He hugged me and spun me around several times, telling me over and over—

"Grandpa said it—only men who cherish their wives can make a fortune. In order to marry such a good wife, I'm definitely going to work hard!"

From then on, Alex put that sentence into practice.

No matter the wind or rain, no matter bitter cold or scorching heat—he didn't slack off a single day.

He already had a head for business. After shedding the disguise of being a slacker, he became unstoppable. In just a few short years, he not only built up his own network of connections, he also saved up a considerable amount of money.

Every time Alex came back after being busy, his biggest pleasure was counting money at home. He liked to divide the money into small stacks, one after another, muttering with conviction—

"This portion is saved for buying a house."

"This portion is kept for marrying Josephine."

"This portion is taken out to buy her new clothes."

My heart ached for how hard it was for him. Alex always said that as long as I was happy, the suffering he endured had meaning.

Just like that, we finally saved enough money to buy a house.

But it was also that year that Alex was diagnosed with heart failure.

The surgery fee was an astronomical figure. Even if I took out everything I had. Even if his sidekick friends emptied their savings, running around everywhere to borrow money—the surgery fee still fell short by $300,000.

I went to loan sharks. Relatives and friends would hide as soon as they saw me.

I truly had no other way, so I could only sell myself.

I went to find Third Master Chen—the one who had tricked me into the red-light district back then. I promised that as long as he was willing to give me $300,000, I would follow him wholeheartedly and work for him for the rest of my life.

After hearing it, Third Master laughed so hard he couldn't straighten up. He looked at me with a face full of contempt.

"How much do I pay to buy a virgin? With trash like you that Alex Harding has already played until it's worn out, you think you're worth $300,000?"

He sized me up from top to bottom, his eyes rolling.

"$300,000 to buy a woman isn't worth it, but to buy some face—that is worth it. It's just that I don't know whether you're willing."

To me at that time, as long as I could save Alex's life, I would agree to anything.

Even if it meant hurting him.

To satisfy Third Master's vile sense of fun, I lied to Alex and said I'd fallen in love with another man. I made him kneel down to me in public.

I uploaded his humble, helpless look onto the internet.

I used every vicious method to hurt him.

During that time, Alex really humbled himself to the extreme. He cut his wrist. He kowtowed. Countless times, with red-rimmed eyes, he asked me why.

And I just kept telling him, cold as ice, "Because I don't love you anymore."

A man who had never been afraid of anything—for the first time in his life, he cried. He was like a child, sobbing, begging me not to leave. He said he'd get proper treatment, find proper work. He'd give me every cent he earned. He only begged me not to leave.

"Josephine, I won't live much longer, I won't live much longer!"

"Just treat it as charity—can you lie to me? Please?"

"I still have a little money stashed at the bank. The password is your birthday."

"I'll give you everything I have—can't you just stay with me two more days? Just two days…"

Alex trampled his own dignity underfoot. He humbled himself to the dust. He didn't even ask me to love him again. He only asked that in the final days of his life, I would look at him one more time.

I lied to him.

I pretended to agree to get back together. And just as hope flickered back to life in his eyes, I stole all his money.

I remember exactly how much was in that account: $35,800.

It was what Alex had saved to be my dowry. He knew I had no parents, no family to prepare these things for me. He didn't want me to lose face when the time came to marry. So he'd asked around everywhere, learned the customs of my hometown, and scraped together a proper dowry fund.

$35,800—I took every last cent.

I didn't even leave him that beat-up motorcycle.

When Alex learned the truth, he vomited blood in the hospital and collapsed on the spot. His boys went crazy, searching the whole country for me. Someone even put out a bounty. They swore they'd cut me into a thousand pieces to avenge him.

But whether it was Alex or anyone else—none of them found me.

Because I was lying in a hospital bed, preparing for the heart surgery that was about to come.

I broke Alex's heart completely.

I sold myself.

But the money from selling myself—I used it to extend his life.

I never told him that our matching had been a perfect success. Just like I never told him the real reason I left.

Fate finally favored this pitiful man.

Alex's surgery went smoothly. Not only did he recover quickly, but through it, he found the family he'd been separated from for years. Only then did everyone learn that this gifted little punk from the streets was actually blood of the wealthy Harding family, abandoned and left outside.

Alex returned to his roots. After all that bitterness, sweetness came. He moved out of Mongkok Tower and received the best medical care money could buy. He inherited the family business and got engaged to a young lady from another prominent family. His life kept getting better. His name appeared constantly on financial news channels.

And I got the cheapest artificial heart.

Curled up here, quietly waiting for life to fade away.

Seven years passed in the blink of an eye.

Even I didn't expect that at the end of my life, I'd see Alex again.

…

The roar of his sports car shattered my memories.

When I looked up, his figure had already vanished into the swirling dust.

I patted myself off and picked up the scattered change from the ground.

Then I went back to that shabby rental room.

Maybe Alex has already forgotten.