“All right, Daddy will come for you tomorrow!”
Mavis said：“Daddy, tomorrow is too soon. There's still so much I haven't settled. Wait a month, until Bartholomew and I are divorced, and then come for me.”
On the other end, her father went quiet for a few seconds. When he spoke again, his voice had dropped low：
“Divorce? When I first wanted to bring you home to inherit the family fortune, you told me you had a husband who loved you deeply. It hasn't been long at all. Why this sudden talk of divorce?”
“Tell Daddy. Has he mistreated you?”
Mavis's throat was raw, and she didn't know where to begin.
Mistreated? Not exactly.
It was only that his heart no longer belonged to her.
She drew in a deep breath and forced down the sob threading through her voice：
“No. I just realized we don't suit each other. It's time to leave.”
Afraid her father might sense something more, Mavis offered a few light words and hung up.
Without thinking, she tapped open her chat thread with Bartholomew.
Somewhere along the way, every reply he sent her had narrowed to a single word: 「Okay.」
She pressed hard against her memory, and at last a few faint threads surfaced.
Half a year ago, she had gone to close a difficult client for Bartholomew, only for the man to take advantage of her.
But that man's project decided whether Henson Group could go public, so Mavis didn't dare offend him. All she could do was send Bartholomew message after message, begging for help.
Her hands had been trembling the whole time she typed.
Those messages were still there, even now：
「Bartholomew, I'm in the Nightfall VIP lounge. Come save me, quick.」
His reply：「Okay.」
Half an hour passed. Mavis sent another message：
「Bartholomew, are you here yet? How much longer? I can't hold on much more.」
Right away, he replied with another okay.
Because of those replies, Mavis kept waiting for him, again and again.
But Bartholomew never came, and she was nearly raped. By some mercy she'd smashed a wine bottle over the client's head, and the police hauled them both away.
Yet that night left her with an intimacy disorder. She couldn't bear any closeness with a man after that.
Bartholomew didn't drift in until the next day, and only then did he apologize.
He said：“Mavis, I'm always so busy, and I was afraid I couldn't reply to you in time, so I set up an auto-reply.”
Bartholomew promised her it would never happen again.
But the ending was always the same.
Mavis scrolled through her old conversations with Bartholomew, deleting each one the moment she read it.
Line by line, she was peeling him out of her heart.
She didn't know how long she deleted before the pain dragged her into a fitful sleep.
At two in the morning, the chime of a message jolted her awake.
Cold sweat still beaded on her forehead. The moment her eyes opened, she saw the taunting messages Sonia had sent, one after another.
In the photo, Sonia's fingers were laced through Bartholomew's, and the ring on the woman's hand was glaringly bright.
The logo on that ring belonged to a brand Bartholomew had designed for her after founding his company.
He'd once called it the symbol of true love, and sworn that this brand would create pieces for her alone, for the rest of his life.
Back then, to design a ring that was one of a kind in all the world, Bartholomew had gone three nights straight without sleep.
The Bartholomew of those days truly had loved her. But how easily a man's love turns on a dime.
She looked at the taunting messages Sonia had sent, one after another.
One of them cut all the way through her.
So while she'd been on the table for her abortion, Bartholomew had been in bed with Sonia.
Mavis curled in on herself against the pain, and forcing it down, she typed out each word：
“Sonia, everything you're wearing, everything on your hand, all of it is marital property shared by me and Bartholomew. Don't come taunting me again, or I'll have you stripped of every last piece on the spot and take back everything that belongs to me!”
