My first instinct was to snatch the tablet and rush to show Sebastian the evidence.
But when he saw the surveillance footage, his eyes turned cold as ice.
"Narelle was right. To cover up your filthy affair, you really would frame her for it."
The AI-generated watermark at the end of the video destroyed me completely.
Narelle threw herself into Sebastian's arms, sobbing. He stroked her hair, comforting her, while his lips curled into a sneer aimed at me.
"Like mother, like daughter. Your mother must have been the same—couldn't keep her legs closed, cheated on your father, then killed herself out of guilt when she was about to be caught."
"First you tried to pin your mother's sins on Narelle's mother. Now you're pulling the same trick on Narelle herself." His voice dripped with contempt. "Did you really think I'd keep falling for your manipulations?"
I stared at him, unable to process what I was hearing.
The deepest, most guarded wound in my soul—and for Narelle's sake, he'd turned it into a blade without a moment's hesitation.
My hand flew up to slap him, but Sebastian caught my wrist and hurled me to the floor like garbage.
"Without my indulgence, Joy, do you really think you have the right to bare your claws at me?"
Narelle rushed over, pretending to help me up. But as she leaned close, her whisper was pure venom.
"You're just as stupid as your dead mother. Yes, I did it—but did you really think I'd hand you the evidence on a silver platter?"
"Your mother couldn't beat mine. And you'll never beat me."
Tears streamed down my face, numb and endless. Somewhere in the middle of crying, I started to laugh.
I lunged for the scissors on the nearby table and drove them toward Narelle.
Sebastian kicked them from my hand. His expression twisted with horror and disgust.
"Have you gone completely insane?"
He swept Narelle into his arms and summoned every top medical specialist in the city to treat her scratch. Then he moved her into my hidden estate.
My condition deteriorated rapidly.
I swallowed antidepressants by the handful. My hair began falling out in clumps. My memory fractured, pieces slipping away like water through cracks.
To survive, I forced myself to stop thinking about Sebastian. I locked myself in my room and buried myself in restoring ancient manuscripts, one crumbling page at a time.
I'd discovered this work by accident after the wedding—a way to escape the pain. Back then, I never imagined it would become my lifeline, the very thing that would help me finally leave Sebastian.
I stopped following news about Sebastian and Narelle.
But as Capital City's power couple, their stories found me anyway.
Today, Sebastian bought Narelle a private island. Tomorrow, they'd appear at some ribbon-cutting ceremony, her arm threaded through his.
Narelle had seamlessly stepped into the role of Mrs. Gilbert. Meanwhile, I had been erased from existence—forgotten, as if I'd never been real at all.
At least I'd grown numb enough that the days somehow kept passing.
Six months slipped by. Then one night, Sebastian came home.
He was drunk—completely wrecked. The moment he walked through the door, his mouth crashed into mine.
I kicked. I clawed. I fought. But he was a man unhinged, deaf to everything, and he took what he wanted.
The next morning, I woke to a bucket of ice water.
Sebastian stood at the bedside, revulsion pouring off him.
"You're disgusting."
"Crawling into my bed while I was drunk—is that how you used to seduce men?"
He called in a professional cleaning crew to sanitize the entire master bedroom. Halfway through, he decided it wasn't enough and had the whole room gutted and rebuilt.
I watched in silence. I didn't bother explaining anymore.
Sebastian would never believe me anyway.
