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02
In my last life, I loved Nathaniel Sanchez.
Not after he saved me, but from the very beginning, from the moment I married him.
He really was a good man.
I never told him what I liked, yet he knew at a glance that I couldn't eat spicy food.
He knew I didn't like bell peppers, didn't like sweets, didn't like milk.
He knew I didn't like pink, didn't like dresses, didn't like fussy, overdone interiors.
So he hired a cook who made Cantonese food for me, filled my closet with casual outfits, and had the whole house redone for me.
He even noticed when my lips went pale that my period had come, and had brown sugar water and painkillers ready for me.
Everything about him was good. He just didn't love me.
He wouldn't kiss me, wouldn't hold my hand, and certainly would never let his guard down and sleep beside me.
He and I were friends, not lovers.
Until the night he got drunk.
His secretary was on leave, so one of his friends called me instead, asking me to bring him home.
Nathaniel held his liquor well. Drunk, he only rested with his eyes closed, just a little slower to react, a little more docile than usual. Whatever you asked him to do, he would do it.
So I got him home without any trouble.
He usually slept in the guest room, but I took him back to his own room and brought him a glass of lemon water.
I meant to just leave, but looking at Nathaniel's lips, still pressed tight even in sleep, something drew me toward him.
I wanted to steal a kiss.
A kiss only I would know about.
That way I could quietly hold on to it alone at night, and not feel so lonely.
I lowered my head and lightly brushed his lips.
There and gone.
The next second, Nathaniel's warm hand pressed against the back of my head and pulled me all the way down.
Nothing like his usual restraint. Nathaniel bit at my lips, out of control, his tongue moving freely inside my mouth.
I was too startled to move, and could only let him take what he wanted.
Until at last, he sighed in satisfaction against my ear, and called out a name “Augusta……”
Only then did I understand that the moonlight he kept hidden in his heart had always been my sister.
My sister and I shared the same mother, after all, and looked somewhat alike. It was no wonder he mistook me for her.
The only one to blame was me, for failing to keep my own heart in check.
And me, for not being able to break free of my family's grip.
Marrying him, I suffered, and so did he.
So in this life, I will let him go, and let myself go too.
Mom looked a little surprised, watching me as if she wanted to say something but couldn't.
In the end, it was Dad who spoke “Antonia Pruitt, the Sanchez household is a mess, and your sister is too soft. She'd only get walked all over if she married in. The two families arranged this match when you were children. There's no breaking it off, so you have to marry.”
I pressed my lips together, wanting to ask why they were so biased, but in the end I never got the words out.
Because I already knew the answer.
My sister was their child. I was only their tool.
I clenched my fists, ignored the ache spreading up from deep inside, lowered my head, and said “Augusta likes Nathaniel too. I don't want to hurt her.”
