No reply came. I closed my phone.
I stood up and started packing, planning to check into a hotel first thing in the morning.
For the next three days, I didn't want to see Kevin Sanchez.
It was almost midnight by the time I was nearly finished.
I had just set my suitcase by the front door when Kevin pushed it open and walked in.
His suit, always immaculate, was wrinkled beyond recognition.
And on his neck, faint lipstick marks.
I forced down the bile rising in my chest.
He spotted me and froze, surprise flickering across his face, followed by a flash of panic.
“Maura, you're still up?”
I didn't answer.
His eyes landed on the suitcase in my hand, and understanding dawned on his face.
“Are you going on a work trip? There's something I need to talk to you about.”
I gave him a flat look, my voice cold：
“Your business has nothing to do with me. Don't tell me. I don't want to know.”
Before Kevin could react, I turned and headed for the guest room.
But as I went to close the door, he jammed his foot in the gap.
I couldn't shut it. He pulled me back out to the living room and sat me down in a chair.
Kevin sat across from me and slid a prenuptial agreement across the table. “Maura, I'm sorry. There's going to be one more person in our life. Two, actually.”
I lifted my gaze and stared at him, cold, saying nothing.
He kept talking anyway.
“The person who added you today, Bertha Barnes. Her parents were my mentors. They were in an accident.”
“Their will asked me to take care of her. From now on, we'll all be living together……”
“This prenuptial agreement is to make sure that after we're married and she moves in, you'll treat her well.”
His gaze locked onto mine, something sharp behind his eyes.
I laughed inside. A hollow, bitter laugh.
Taking care of his late mentor's daughter. Taking care of her all the way to a wedding photo shoot.
How he managed to say something so righteous with a straight face was beyond me.
Kevin Sanchez truly thought I was a fool.
I smiled, casual and loose. ：“But that's only one person, isn't it?”
Kevin paused. His throat bobbed. “She's pregnant. So that makes two. I'll need you to look after her.”
As he said it, his eyes softened with a tenderness I knew too well. Only it had never been for me.
My nails dug into my palms. I was trying to stay calm, but my heart swelled and ached all the same.
During our first year together, I had been pregnant too. He coaxed me with sweet words, told me he wanted to be child-free, that he didn't want kids. He coaxed me into terminating the pregnancy.
Now I finally understood. Child-free was the excuse. It wasn't that he didn't want children. He just didn't want me to have them.
But none of it mattered anymore.
I said nothing. In Kevin's eyes, my silence was consent.
Then a crack of thunder split the air outside, and rain came pouring down. “”
Kevin's phone buzzed. A custom ringtone.
Back when I still loved him blindly, I had taken his phone and tried to set a custom ringtone just for my calls.
He'd taken it back. “Maura, that's childish. It doesn't fit my image.”
I could only swallow my disappointment.
The thunder grew louder. Kevin's expression shifted, worry creasing his brow.
“Maura, it's thundering. Bertha's alone. She gets scared.”
He stood, reaching over to ruffle the top of my head in passing, like soothing a cat that never scratches back.
“Stay home by yourself tonight. I'm going to be with Bertha. Don't forget to sign the agreement.”
Kevin forgot that I was afraid of thunder too.
That malpractice riot at the hospital had happened on a night just like this. Thunder and rain. It left a scar in my mind that never healed.
He had held me in his arms and promised me：
“Every rainy night from now on, I'll be right here beside you.”
But the moment his first love came back, he forgot every vow along with her.
Kevin left without hesitation, as if leaving me behind was the simplest thing in the world.
But I refused to fall apart over a man like him, and I refused to stand still waiting for a love that was never going to arrive.
