I handed my resignation letter to the board.
Within half an hour, the whole company knew: I was the one who was Amos Rowe's girlfriend.
But the way everyone looked at me landed on me like a spray of fine needles.
Surprise. Mockery. Amusement.
And that faint thread of contempt……
Lena was furious on my behalf.
"Narelle, Amos cheated, and then he dragged you out here to take the fall. Don't be a fool!"
"If anyone should be resigning, it's him. What kind of man shoves you out front like this?"
"And to think I actually believed he had a sense of responsibility, that he owned up to things."
I gave a careless shrug.
"Relax. I'm not being a fool."
Before, I really had been foolish.
Blind to whatever was going on between Amos and Cecily.
Blind, too, to what was in his heart.
But now I was clear-headed.
I knew exactly what I was doing.
Seeing that she couldn't talk me out of it, Lena shook her head helplessly and walked off.
I just never imagined it.
That I would leave the company in a way this undignified.
Still, it didn't matter.
Everything has two sides, and this actually spared me a lot of trouble.
Ignoring the pointing fingers, I gathered up my things and walked out of the place where I'd worked for five years.
From start to finish, Amos never came to see me off.
He watched every bit of it through the blinds.
He took in the expression on every single person's face.
But still he chose to let me face it alone.
Whatever last trace of attachment I'd had for him vanished completely.
……
Amos stood by the window.
He watched Narelle's figure until it disappeared down the street.
Somehow.
His heartbeat suddenly went ragged.
Frustrated, he drove his fist into the wall.
Just then, his phone rang at the worst possible moment.
He hesitated a long time before answering.
"When exactly are you planning to come clean with Narelle?"
On the other end, Cecily's voice was pushy, nothing like the gentle, sweet tone she used to have.
Amos pinched the bridge of his nose.
"Can we hold off a little? She just cleaned up this crisis for us. Bringing up a breakup right now, isn't that too cruel?"
Cecily's voice jumped an octave.
"And it isn't cruel to me? For the last six months I've had to hide in the shadows."
"On the surface I have to play her good best friend, and behind her back I have to sneak around with you."
"You told me to wait. I've waited half a year and you still haven't brought up the breakup. Are you trying to back out?"
Amos let out a sigh.
"All right, all right. Narelle went away on a trip. Once she's back I'll come clean with her. That works, doesn't it?"
After a lot of coaxing, he finally smoothed Cecily over.
But there was a hollow ache in his chest, a stifled, restless misery he couldn't put into words.
Six months ago, Narelle had been working late at the office.
Cecily had taken the chance to throw herself at him, saying she'd fallen for him and couldn't help herself.
He didn't know what had gotten into him that day; as if driven by something, he'd ended up in bed with Cecily.
Afterward, he'd regretted it, and he'd suffered over it.
But he was greedy for the thrill Cecily gave him.
And he couldn't bear to give up a five-year relationship.
After all, back when he had nothing to his name, it was Narelle who'd been with him without a hint of disdain.
More than half the credit for where he was today belonged to Narelle.
And so Amos went on juggling the two women, sinking deeper and deeper.
Now Cecily was forcing him to make a decision.
It was like being held over a fire and roasted again and again.
All he could do was use work as an excuse, dodging Cecily for two days straight without going home.
Seeing Amos take this attitude, Cecily felt more and more wronged the longer she thought about it.
She couldn't take it anymore. In the end she packed up all her intimate photos with Amos and their chat logs and sent the whole thing to me.
She sent Amos the screenshots too.
【Since you can't make up your mind, let me make the decision for you.】
The moment Amos saw the message, the color drained from his face.
Even his breathing turned chaotic.
Panicked, he dialed a video call, wanting to explain.
And I was in the middle of my wedding.
On the screen, I wore a white gown, my arm linked through that of the handsome, dashing groom at my side.
Amos's throat was so dry his voice cracked. "Narelle, what are you doing?"
A faint smile rose at the corners of my eyes. "You can't even tell? I'm getting married."
The words had barely left my mouth.
There was only a dull thud.
Amos's phone slipped from his hand and crashed hard to the floor.
