I called Clive with shaking hands.
"Why would you put out a statement like that?"
He didn't even pause. "Someone posted the whole thing online, and now everyone's asking me about it. What was I supposed to do? If you hadn't made a scene, none of this would be happening!"
"Someone recognized Jade at the hospital. She's just a young woman. Getting dragged into something like this is bad for her."
"And it isn't bad for me?" My voice broke.
He gave a short laugh. "You got drugged and walked around the next day like nothing happened. A little name-calling, and you're falling apart?"
"Stop blowing this out of proportion. I'm going to ride the momentum from the statement and do a livestream to give Jade the proposal I owe her. Bring me the ring. You can apologize to her on camera, in front of everyone. That clears her name, and maybe the public lets you off too."
"That ring is one I designed myself." I couldn't hold it in. "And you want me to hand it to another woman?"
His tone turned heavy with meaning. "It's just a ring, Millicent. The storm has to die down first. Only after that—after a long time apart—can I come back to your side."
"I know I'm all you have. If there were any other way, I wouldn't leave you either."
He'd said something like that when he proposed too.
"I know I'm all you have. If there were any other way..."
"I want to be the one you lean on."
After my mother died and the shock left my father paralyzed by a stroke, Clive became the only thing I had to lean on.
And now he was using exactly that. He thought I couldn't live without him, so he could humiliate me however he pleased.
Whatever was left of my heart went cold.
The moment I hung up, someone shouted, "The police are here! Quick! We've caught the murderer, Millicent Maddox!"
So while I'd been on the phone, someone had used the chance to call them.
They took me to the station.
But what waited for me wasn't an interrogation. It was footage.
An officer pointed to the timestamp in the bottom left corner. "Does this date mean anything to you?"
"Yes."
It was the most painful day of my life. And the happiest.
Three months ago, at the Sanchez company gala, Clive was supposed to give the opening speech, and he never showed.
When I couldn't reach him no matter what I tried, the news broke that a pileup had happened on the only road he could have taken.
I rushed to the hospital and heard the blood bank was running dangerously low, while a patient named Sanchez urgently needed a transfusion.
I grabbed the first doctor who passed. "Take my blood! I'm his girlfriend! Take as much as you need!"
The bag slowly filled with red while my vision went black, and I kept praying he was safe, even if it cost me my life.
That was when my phone rang.
Clive's voice came through, perfectly fine. "Where did you go? I didn't pick up because I was setting up a surprise for you. Stop sulking and come back already!"
A false alarm. I was wild with joy. I ignored the nurse's protests and dragged my body, weak and cold from blood loss, out of the hospital. All I wanted was to see him.
That night, with no warning at all, Clive proposed.
I was drowning in the joy of getting back what I thought I'd lost, in the happiness of a proposal from the man I loved.
I never noticed that his so-called surprise was a single ring that didn't fit my finger.
On the screen, that night finally came back to me as it had truly happened.
At the roadside, the window of an SUV rolled down and a skimpy maid costume came flying out.
The car rocked, and through the glass I saw them—Clive and Jade twisted together, moving, and the ring catching the light on her hand.
The ring Clive used to propose to me.
So while I was begging the nurses to draw eight hundred milliliters of my blood, ready to trade my life for his safety, he was rolling around with Jade.
And the proposal ring had just been slipped off her finger.
A tearing pain ripped through the heart that had long gone numb, and the tears came before I could stop them.
In silence, the officer opened another clip.
When I saw what was on it, my hand froze in the middle of wiping my tears.
