Chapter 1

Ten years after our breakup, I found out my ex-boyfriend was still offering a huge reward to find me.

I let out a scoff and swiped the message away.

We didn’t end things peacefully.

The year we broke up, he got another woman pregnant.

And thanks to his mother’s scheme, I ended up pregnant by someone else too.

When he found out, he lost control and made me take abortion pills.

He cried and said, “I just want you to understand. In a family like ours, my life isn’t my own to live.”

“I can give you anything except an official status in my life.”

His mother said, “Our family will never accept someone from the bottom. There’s no way I’ll let our bloodline continue with someone like that!”

He just stood there, listening, not saying a word.

After that, I disappeared from his world.

A decade passed. Suddenly, he was in front of me again.

His face, even more refined and elegant than before, showed a rare vulnerability as his eyes grew red.

He said, “I’ve changed. My parents no longer have the power to dictate who I love.”

“Can we start over?”

I shook my head. “No.”

He looked lost. “Why?”

I answered calmly, “Because my husband wouldn’t allow it.”

...

He froze. His eyes trembled.

With tears brimming, his gaze looked especially bright.

I thought this would finally make him give up, but instead I heard him say—

“Just like ten years ago, you still know how to hurt me with your words.”

Eric Carter’s voice was choked for a second. Then he looked at me with an intensity that bordered on desperate.

“I should treat you the way I did ten years ago.”

With that, he strode over.

I panicked and stepped back, dodging his embrace and his forceful kiss.

Ten years ago, whenever I said something sharp, he would silence me with a kiss. He’d only let me go when I was nearly out of breath, proud of himself and always wanting more.

Facing my rejection and distance, he paused, just hesitated for a moment, then came toward me again.

I retreated again, putting more distance between us. My voice rose. “Eric!”

He stopped.

In an instant, all his hope was replaced with hurt.

“It’s been ten years. I don’t believe you haven’t missed me.”

What a joke.

I sneered inside.

No one ever misses an ex when their new love is good enough.

“That’s your problem,” I said. “The past is in the past.”

“We’re not the same people anymore.”

My calm attitude hit him hard. He couldn’t accept it, and let out a hollow laugh.

“I can’t move on.”

“I thought I could forget you, but the longer I try, the more impossible it becomes!”

His eyes glistened as he sniffed quietly, trying to keep his composure.

This time, his voice softened.

“I know what’s on your mind.”

“I divorced her. The child… didn’t survive. So you don’t have to worry, you won’t have to be a stepmom.”

“As for my mom… she had a stroke. She won’t bully you again.”

“I’m in charge of the family business now. In the Carter family, I make the decisions.”

“I can marry you in a proper, official way.”

He rushed to say it all in one breath.

Ten years later, he’d ripped open all the old wounds that had already scarred over, exposing them again.

That chapter—the one that haunts my nightmares—flashed through my mind like it was yesterday.

The day I turned twenty, he’d said:

“Vivian Reed, I can openly and officially marry you!”

“I’ll spend my life loving you. Please, will you marry me?”

I said yes. I even accepted the giant diamond ring he offered.

But the next day, my family lost everything because of that engagement ring.

Diane Carter, his mother, dressed in her expensive clothes, showed up at my door.

She regarded me with utter contempt, as if I were nothing more than a nuisance under her boot.

She circled me repeatedly, her gaze sharp and suffocating, steeped in the arrogance of long-held power.

“Get real. This isn’t a fairy tale—princes don’t fall for Cinderellas anymore.”

“I can accept you as my son’s plaything. But a girl from the bottom of society? There’s no way you’re marrying into a family like the Carters.”

She pulled out a lawsuit and slammed it into my face.

“Return the ring! or get ready for a lawsuit!”

Chapter 2

Stung in my pride, I straightened up at once and rummaged through my bag, trying to give her back the ring.

But the ring was gone.

Diane humiliated me again, her voice dripping with disdain. In front of me, she threw the ring Eric gave me into the sea.

That’s when I realized—the ring had already been taken by her. She did it on purpose, just to humiliate me.

“You can tell Eric everything if you want. Let’s see—do you think he’ll believe you or me!”

She really did sue me.

To pay for the ring, my parents sold our only house and fell into heavy debt.

Because of all this, I had an argument with Eric.

“Your mom is a villain! What she did is truly evil!”

It was the first time I saw him flushed with anger. He refused to back down. He shouted at me:

“Don’t talk about my mom like that!”

“She just wants her ring back! If you go along with her for now, I’ll buy you a new one later!”

“If you’d just given the ring back, none of this would’ve happened!”

“My mom is sick! For my sake, can you just give in a little?”

That was our first real argument—because of his mother.

He believed everything Diane said, thinking I kept the ring on purpose.

He blamed me for mishandling the situation, believing that if I had only been more tactful, things wouldn't have ended this way.

For the first time, I felt truly disappointed in him.

He, stuck in the middle, struggled in agony again and again.

Eric’s sudden step forward snapped me back to the present.

“Eric, it’s not possible!”

“I’ve already moved on with my life.”

“Even if I didn’t have a new life, even if your mother were dead, I’d still never come back.”

“I hate her. I hate you too.”

My voice trembled as I spoke. Every time those wounds came to mind, my heart ached as if twisted apart.

Eric froze. Guilt and regret filled his eyes, innocent and ashamed.

“The past was hard on all of us,” he said. “We both made mistakes—there were misunderstandings. Let me explain everything, please, sweetheart.”

I shook my head. I didn’t want to relive those old wounds.

He grew anxious, his eyes reddening as he struggled to hold back tears.

Facing my rejection, he became even more nervous—so cautious, afraid I’d slip away.

“Just stay out of my life. That’s it,” I said.

I turned to leave.

He caught my hand, refusing to let go, and started dragging me upstairs.

“No matter what you say this time, I won’t let go of your hand again.”

“I’ll show you right now. My mom really is bedridden from a stroke!”

He didn’t give me a choice and pulled me to the bedroom on the second floor.

On the bed lay the face that had haunted my nightmares for years.

She opened her eyes, and they widened in shock when she saw me.

Just like all those years ago—when Diane found out Eric and I were still together.

She forced a bottle of drugged drink down my throat, spitting words full of hatred:

“You stubborn little bitch! You just won’t learn, will you? Fine—I’ll make sure you regret ever crossing me!”

“I told you to stay away from my son! I already ruined your family—you still aren’t afraid?”

“I’ll ruin you right now!”

“My son would never want a woman who’s been ruined!”

Her people held down my arms. I was forced to drink the whole bottle of that drugged beverage.

Then, she put me in a private room with Eric’s sworn enemy...

Drugged and helpless, I was toyed with for hours by that man.

Broken and lost, I clung to what was left of me and ran to Eric.

But when I found him, he was in bed with a girl whose family matched his—perfect on paper.

I froze, like the world had ended.

He just stared angrily at the marks on my neck and snapped, “What? You betrayed me, didn’t you? Why shouldn’t I do the same?”

That moment shattered me. In my pain, I laughed.

So, he knew all along. He knew—and still pretended not to see me suffer.

Chapter 3

Memories cut like knives, slicing my heart until it bleeds.

Staring at Diane’s face, I clenched my fists so tight my nails dug into my palms. My jaw ached from how hard I bit down. The anger that I’d tried to bury for years broke free. I stepped forward and slapped her hard across the face.

“That’s what you owe me from when I was twenty!”

Diane’s face twisted in anger. She glared at me, eyes full of venom.

Eric’s eyes went wide with shock—he hadn’t expected me to fight back.

He stepped forward from behind and wrapped his arms around me, trying to calm my raging emotions. “Vivian Reed, it’s over now. None of that will ever happen again, I swear.”

But being in his arms only made my hatred burn hotter. I spun around and slapped him too, hard across the face.

“That’s for what you owe me!”

“If I’d known saving you would doom my whole family to a half-life—if I’d known it would leave us in ruins—I never would’ve saved you.”

Five bright red fingerprints bloomed on his pale cheek.

That slap made him smile.

“It’s good. I’m glad you can finally get mad at me.”

He took two steps closer, caught both my hands, and pulled them toward his face. “Go ahead, hit me. Hit me as much as you want. Even if you beat me to death, it’s fine as long as it makes you feel better.”

I stood there, stunned.

He didn’t care about the pain.

If anything, I was the one whose hand ached from hitting him.

“Enough! Maybe I should just die—would that finally satisfy you?!”

The sharp smack of slaps rang out until Diane’s furious yell stopped everything.

She glared at me, looking at me with the same disdain as back then, but this time there was helpless compromise in her eyes.

“I won’t stand in your way anymore. If you want to be together, then go ahead and be together.” She forced out the words, each syllable bitten off, bitter and unwilling.

I couldn’t help but laugh—bitter and cold. “Your son is trash to me now. Even if you handed him over, I wouldn’t want him.”

That stung both Diane Carter and Eric Carter to the core.

Eric stared at me, pain and accusation filling his eyes—begging me to stop hurting him with my words.

Diane gave a cold snort and snapped at Eric, “See? Even if I approve, she’ll never take you back!”

Her frustration spilled over, her words edged with heartbreak. “You’re willing to live a life of misery for a woman like her! Is it worth it?!”

“It is!” he answered firmly.

I turned away, not wanting to be dragged back into their toxic world.

Eric grabbed my hand again, his words tumbling out quickly, “I only married Angela Foster because my mom was sick—only Angela could be her match for the surgery. If I didn’t marry Angela, she wouldn’t agree to the operation. Back then, I truly had no choice—it wasn’t that I didn’t want to take responsibility for you!”

“Vivian, every word is true. Please, believe me—just this once.”

I yanked my hand free, keeping my resolve hard as steel.

“None of it matters anymore. I just want my peace.”

“If you don’t let me go right now, I’ll call the police.”

He stood there, frozen, forcing a bitter smile.

His smile trembled and, before I knew it, tears spilled down his face.

But as I walked away, I heard his voice—steadfast and certain—call out behind me:

“I know you still love me, Vivian Reed! I’ll make sure we end up together again! No one can stop us!”

Chapter 4

I didn’t take Eric’s strangely confident words to heart.

I blocked him on my phone, every social media account, and every messaging app I had.

I never expected to run into the last person I wanted to see at a charity gala.

Diane Carter sat in her wheelchair, still looking regal and refined.

When she saw me, her maid pushed her right over.

We stood alone in a quiet corner. She leaned in, her voice so low no one else could hear—just like when she used to humiliate me at twenty, she was ready to do it all over again.

“Still playing hard to get, are you? What a joke!” She sneered.

“Stop pretending. You only came here to get my son’s attention!”

She looked me up and down with nothing but disdain.

“I’ll say it again. Someone like you will never be more than a plaything for my son!”

Her next words were knives. “Don’t forget, years ago, Eric made you take an entire bottle of that stuff—forced you to drink it all, didn’t he!”

“That drug means you’ll never have kids. Now I just let him be obsessed with you—once he’s bored, he’ll see a useless woman like you isn’t worth anything!”

Ten years ago, I didn’t just almost lose my chance to ever have children—I nearly died.

When he found out I was pregnant with his rival’s child, he was frantic—crying, desperate—and forced me to swallow those pills that would end the pregnancy.

Back then, he said, “As long as you don’t have this baby, I’ll make myself keep loving you.”

“I’m giving you a chance to fix this. Just listen to me, be good and take the pills.”

What he didn’t know was, I wanted this child gone even more than he did.

I refused the pills—not because I wanted to keep the baby, but because his mother had switched them out and doubled the dose.

Eric saw me resist and decided I must have cheated on him and fallen for his rival—that’s why I didn’t want the pills. That’s what he thought.

That day, I lay on the floor, writhing in agony as blood slowly spread across the carpet.

And when Angela called Eric to take her for a pregnancy check, he left me alone in that room.

He’ll never know I almost died because of him.

Diane’s mocking laugh snapped me back to reality.

Anger burned in my throat—I couldn’t swallow it down. I raised my hand and slapped her, right there for everyone to see.

“Having a mother like you is a disgrace for Eric Carter!”

Diane’s furious expression changed in a heartbeat. She covered her cheek, tears springing to her eyes as she wailed, “I know I was wrong to stand in your way before.”

“I’m truly sorry. I hope you and Eric can be together.”

“If it’ll make you feel better, hit me as much as you want.”

Her crying and my slap drew everyone’s attention, just as Eric rushed over.

He reached for me, trying to hold me close. “You came here to see me—that’s all I could ever want.”

“Vivian, can you just give me and my mom a little respect in front of all these people? Do whatever you want once we’re home.”

His voice was soft, just for me.

I stepped away, cold and distant. “Eric Carter, keep your mother on a leash!”

“If this happens again, it won’t just be a slap!”

My words annoyed the onlookers.

“That girl sure talks tough—she even hit and scolded an elder. She must have no manners at all!”

The one speaking didn’t know me, but I recognized him—a hanger-on for the Carter family, always trying to win favor, hoping to get scraps from their business.

A balding man in his forties, all fake smiles, looking like a loyal lapdog.

But then—

“Who said my wife doesn’t know how to behave?!”

“My mommy is the best—you’re the one with no manners!”

My three-year-old son and husband’s voices boomed out at the same time.

The crowd parted and I saw them—my husband and our son, striding over with confidence and strength. The look on Eric’s face changed instantly.