When the words left her lips, the entire hall fell silent.
Camilla broke the stillness with a laugh. She turned toward Dominic, her voice light.
“Well Dom, it seems your girlfriend is quite eager for you to fulfill her wish this year. You’d better hurry up. And when it happens, don’t forget to invite me to the wedding banquet.”
Dominic’s stunned expression darkened as the weight of her words sank in.
Valerie noticed his rising anger and instinctively moved to explain herself, but he cut her off sharply.
“Do you think this is funny, Camilla? What will it take for you to stop? Do you really want to push me to my breaking point?”
His accusations, tinged with anger, weren’t directed at Valerie. They were aimed squarely at Camilla.
The frustration in his tone and the emotions flickering across his face—grief, indignation, and helplessness—made his feelings all too clear.
He wasn’t angry about the moment. He was furious at Camilla’s feigned ignorance and the way she trampled over his unspoken emotions yet again.
The atmosphere in the hall had gone ice-cold.
In a fit of rage, Dominic kicked over a chair, grabbed his car keys, and stormed out, slamming the door behind him.
What had started as a celebratory birthday party had now ended in utter disarray.
As the remaining guests began murmuring to each other, shrugging off the tension, and trickling out of the venue, Valerie lowered her gaze.
She grabbed her purse and quietly excused herself.
When she stepped back into the corridor, the guests were gone, but the faint echoes of a heated argument reverberated from the far end of the hallway.
“You’ve gone too far today, Camilla! Do you have any idea how hard Dom prepared for your birthday party? Why did you have to ruin his efforts and say those things to provoke him in front of everyone?”
“Was I not telling the truth? His girlfriend wants to get married. If it’s not him, who else would it be?”
“Damn it! Do you think this is funny? Dom has always loved you! Ever since you rejected him back then, you shattered him so completely that he turned into some reckless, aimless playboy.
“And then, the moment you beckoned him back, he came running to you again! But when you said he lacked loyalty, he went and found this rebound girlfriend just to please you. What more do you want? His sincerity doesn’t deserve to be trampled on like this!”
“So what? I’ve never seen someone so infatuated like him before. I just wanted to see how far he’d go for me. He’s doing it willingly—why are you so worked up about it?”
It was Camilla arguing with one of Dominic’s closest friends.
Valerie hadn’t intended to eavesdrop on their private conversation, but she couldn’t stop her thoughts from wandering. If Dominic overheard those words, what kind of expression would he wear?
Would it break his heart?
Would he ache as she did when she discovered the truth, a pain so deep she felt like dying?
Between her and Dominic, he always held the reins. As long as he showed even a shred of care, her emotions would spiral in response.
But between Dominic and Camilla, he was the powerless one. A single careless word from her, a mere hint of her indifference, and he would crumble completely.
After all, betrayal will never go unpunished.
Valerie turned away and descended the stairs from the far side of the hall, choosing a quieter path.
Back home, Valerie picked up the cake that had been left by the door and gave herself a quiet birthday celebration.
It was a six-inch cake, but she ate half before heading to bed.
The next day, she was startled awake by a knock at the door. Rubbing her eyes, she shuffled over to answer it.
It was Dominic.
After just one night apart, his expression still carried traces of lingering anger, his face shadowed with frustration. Yet, when his gaze met hers, he forced a strained smile and pulled a diamond bracelet from his pocket.
“Happy birthday. This is your gift. I drank too much yesterday and forgot to give it to you.”
Valerie took one glance at the bracelet and instantly recognized it—it was the matching set to the diamond necklace Camilla had worn the night before.
She couldn’t help but think that he was merely repurposing something Camilla didn’t like, passing it off to her as a convenient solution to avoid the effort of picking out a gift.
Wasn’t that a fair assumption?
Dominic mistook her silence for dissatisfaction. He quickly added, “You don’t like it? Then just buy whatever you want and put it on my card.”
Valerie shook her head, reached out to take the bracelet, and casually set it down on the entryway table.
“It’s fine. I like it. No need for anything else.”
