“This marriage alliance is very important to me.” Stuart’s voice brushed against Michelle’s ear, low and pressing. “You have to understand it. Don’t cause trouble for me at this time. Once I marry her, things between us can still go back to the way they were.”
‘Ha.' Michelle almost laughed aloud. ‘The way we were? Does he mean I should continue being at his beck and call when he needs me, only to be tossed aside once he’s basking in marital bliss?’
Who was truly deluding themselves here? She certainly didn’t recall ever agreeing to be with Stuart in the first place.
“Janet is the Brewsterss’s only daughter. She was raised like a princess, pampered since childhood. Naturally, she’s a little spoiled. Why must you—”
Michelle didn’t let him finish. She stepped out from beneath the umbrella, no longer caring.
Walking aimlessly against the pounding rain, water spread coldly across her face.
Suddenly, a car sped past, splashing up a sheet of dirty water that drenched her completely.
The window rolled down. In the back seat, Janet looked just as smug as ever while Stuart remained indifferent, as if he hadn’t seen a thing.
“Just great,” Janet sneered. “It’s pouring, I’m already pissed, and now some lowlife wants to get hit.”
She gestured to the driver. “Come on, let’s go.”
The tires cut through another puddle, spraying water again. This time, Michelle stepped back quickly, avoiding it.
‘From now on,’ she told herself, ‘I’ll do the same in life—step away, avoid every disgusting entanglement tied to them.’
When she finally returned to her rented apartment, Michelle sat down and began sorting through Stuart’s medical records from the past five years.
As a psychologist, her conscience was clear. Even though her license had been suspended, she wanted to fight for herself. If she could no longer stay with her institution, she could at least open her own clinic.
But she had underestimated Janet’s dirty games.
Just as Michelle finished organizing the files and was about to send them to her, her phone rang first.
“Michelle!” Alfred’s stern voice snapped through the line. “Didn’t you sign a confidentiality agreement with Mr. Stuart? Why has your matter blown up on trending topics?!”
Heart pounding, Michelle hurried to open the link her mentor had sent.
A second later, her phone slipped from her hand and hit the floor.
It was over. Someone had exposed Stuart’s secrets!
And as if that wasn’t enough, the smear campaign painting her as a mistress hadn’t even died down yet. Now, the two scandals had merged, skyrocketing together on the trending list.
The Huggetts and Brewsterss were already magnets for attention, and the online posts were dripping with insinuations.
They endlessly praised Janet and Stuart as a perfect match while painting Michelle as nothing more than a delusional gold-digging mistress. The comments repeatedly emphasized her and Stuart’s doctor–patient relationship, twisting the knife deeper.
The public’s opinion exploded. Insults poured in like a tidal wave.
Within just a few hours, Michelle’s real identity was dug out and plastered online. She was on the verge of complete social ruin!
“Michelle? Dr. Burnell!” her mentor’s anxious voice called again from the other end. Michelle blinked back into focus. “This can’t blow up any further. If it does, the industry association will sanction you! You need to go to Mr. Stuart immediately and have him suppress the trending topic!”
Michelle remained silent for a long time, staring at the neatly organized files in front of her. Suddenly, she let out a bitter laugh.
‘Go to Stuart? From the very beginning, isn’t this entire mess likely orchestrated by him and Janet?’
Michelle had stood by Stuart for five years—she knew him too well. Nothing he didn’t want, nothing he didn’t permit, could ever make it past his watchful eye. Now that the scandal had been trending for hours, how could he possibly be unaware?
But she said none of this. Instead, she softly apologized to her mentor and submitted her resignation on her own.
After hanging up, Michelle ignored the flood of harassing calls and the stream of abusive text messages.
She opened her chat with Stuart and saw the message he had just sent.
[Behave yourself. Wait quietly.]
‘So, he knew. Of course, he knew,’ Michelle sneered inwardly.
Her fingers gripped the phone so tightly they turned pale, her whole body trembling with rage.
‘Five freaking years. This is what I got in return for dedicating myself to treating him for five years?!’
Disappointment crashed over her like a relentless tide, drowning her until nothing was left but numbness.
She powered off her phone and slowly collapsed onto the floor. She didn’t cry. She was simply… too exhausted.
