"You’ve got the wrong person!" Joanna calmly turned her face away, deliberately emphasizing each word as she called him by his current name.
"Drake! Look closely, who am I really?"
The night breeze sobered Darren a little. Just as he reached out, wanting to hold the woman in front of him, Zaylee suddenly appeared behind them.
A harsh slap landed squarely on Joanna’s face. Gritting her teeth, Zaylee pointed at her nose and shouted, "Joanna, your husband’s dead and now you’re seducing someone else’s? What were you two doing alone in the middle of the night?"
How ironic.
Joanna, who was once Darren’s lawfully wedded wife, was now being slapped by the mistress.
Joanna raised her hand high, ready to return that slap, but Darren grabbed her wrist and flung it aside harshly.
"Enough!" the man barked, now fully sober. "Joanna, I was just drunk tonight. Don’t take it to heart. Maybe I’ve been missing my brother too much lately and got possessed by his spirit, which led to such inappropriate behavior. As for Zaylee, she’s young and immature. It was just a slap, try to be more understanding."
Joanna suddenly laughed. Her lowered hand rose again. This time, it landed squarely on Darren’s cold, emotionless face.
"Oh? Since you feel so sorry for your wife, then you can take this slap on her behalf. Be more understanding? Sorry, that’s something I’ll never learn in this lifetime!"
On the day of her discharge, the night was deep and silent. Joanna, heavily pregnant, walked alone.
Suddenly, a group of men emerged in the dim underground parking lot. One of them covered her mouth and nose from behind and dragged her toward a van.
When she opened her eyes again, she found herself in an abandoned warehouse on the outskirts of town. Tied to a chair like her was Zaylee, crying bitterly with tears streaming down her face.
A man with a scar on his face lashed a whip down, causing Zaylee to instantly drop to her knees and beg for mercy. "I’m part of the Grive Family! I can give you however much money you want! Please, just let me go! I’m pregnant too!"
To her surprise, the men burst out laughing. "Pregnant? Both of the women we kidnapped are expecting? Well, that makes things even more interesting!"
"Drake took over the Grive Group and still owes us back wages. So don’t blame us for kidnapping his wife and child. But looks like our intel was off. We caught two women. Now tell us, which one of you is really Drake’s woman?"
Zaylee immediately denied it on the spot, "It’s her! She’s the one you’re looking for! I have nothing to do with this! Please, I’m begging you, just let me go!"
The rusted warehouse doors were suddenly kicked open from the outside. It was Darren as Drake, dressed neatly in a suit.
The rough ropes dug deep into Joanna’s wrists, her palms already bleeding. She looked up just in time to see Darren swallow hard, then he pointed directly at her.
"The one with the bigger belly is my wife. You all better take a good look."
"As for the one next to her… she’s my late elder brother’s wife. She has nothing to do with this."
"Let the innocent one go. As for the rest, do whatever you want."
In that instant, all the blood in Joanna’s body turned cold.
She let out a cold laugh. Sure enough, between the two women, he still chose Zaylee.
She had long stopped having any illusions about him, but hearing those words with her own ears still made her heart twist in unbearable pain.
"Do whatever you want?"
He was willing to abandon even his own flesh and blood for Zaylee.
Zaylee was handed over to Darren. He immediately breathed a sigh of relief, holding the woman in his arms and checking her body for any scars.
But Joanna became the target of vengeance by desperate criminals.
The whip struck down, one lash after another, harsh and piercing, tearing the skin and flesh on her back. Yet Joanna endured it all silently without a sound.
What’s the use of crying? No one would feel sorry for her.
In the chaos, someone set a fire. The raging flames quickly spread and everyone fled in panic.
Joanna was tied to the chair, unable to move a muscle, her life hanging by a thread. Yet Darren’s heart and eyes were fixed only on Zaylee.
He only glanced at Joanna once, his eyes filled with inner struggle. But urged on by the woman, his expression hardened with resolve.
“Hold on a little longer! I’ll take Zaylee outside first, then come back to save you!”
“She’s carrying my child. I absolutely can’t let anything happen to her. Sorry!”
Holding Zaylee tightly in his arms, Drake turned and ran out.
The ceiling beam collapsed right in front of Joanna, blocking her path to escape.
“Darren…”
Before losing consciousness, scenes from three years ago when Darren was caught in a fire flooded Joanna’s mind.
Even though he was unconscious, she still rushed into the fire alone, carrying him out by herself, even sacrificing one of her kidneys to save him.
The boomerang of the past had now struck him right between the eyes.
