Once The Contract Marriage was Over, I was Ready to Leave My CEO Husband

###Chapter 1

"Please help me look at this divorce agreement," I said as I pushed the yellowed paper over.

"This was signed on the wedding night of David and me ten years ago. Was there anything else I needed to do?"

After flipping through it, my lawyer frowned.

"It would automatically take effect in half a month and you could go directly to get the divorce certificate. But you had a lovely daughter, Ma’am … were you really willing to leave him?"

My fingers dug into the sofa unconsciously.

"Yes, I would do as he wished!"

Two days ago, I had flown abroad to discuss business for Yates Corporation but received a video of my daughter being imprisoned on the plane. In the footage, sevenyearold Charlotte was tied up in the basement and it was David's bodyguard who poured feces on her.

"You stupid girl, how dare you slander Miss Hurley for having a child with someone else! Everyone knew that Miss Hurley even gave her virginity to Mr. Yates!"

David's first love, Jessica Hurley, stood aside, holding her nose and sneering.

"No matter what bad things you two mother and daughter said about me, don't think David would believe it. After all, he only loved me."

David suddenly appeared at the door. My heart was hanging, hoping that he would save our daughter, but he ignored Charlotte's tearful eyes and directly picked up the flustered Jessica.

Jessica pretended to be wronged.

"I locked up your daughter. Weren’t you angry?"

The man's gentle eyes fell on her slightly protruding belly and he replied indifferently, "She was just the product of me forgetting to add contraceptives to Catherine's milk."

"Jessica, our child would inherit everything. As for them, mother and daughter, I should be able to compensate them with the rest of my life."

Darkness swallowed my breath in an instant. At that moment, I was completely awake. Pleading for the plane to return immediately, I made a phone call.

"Mr. Powell, I accepted your offer and I would start working in your company in half a month."

Half a month later, I would give David Yates the ‘freedom’ he had dreamed of.

When I got home, I saw my daughter lying in bed with a fever and unconscious because of the shock. My heart was broken.

My daughter frowned and cried nightmarishly, "Dad, help me … "

The helpless whine, like an abandoned beast cub, made my heart bleed.

I went back to the bedroom and found the divorce agreement from the deep of the cabinet. When David came out of the bathroom, I had wiped away my tears. The halfopen white shirt revealed a strong chest and a few fresh lipstick marks.

When he saw me, he was stunned for a moment.

However, he did not feel guilty about his daughter's experience at all as he quickly yelled at me in the first sentence he talked to me, "Did you know that returning to the ship without permission almost destroyed Yates Corporation's business worth hundreds of millions?!"

"You and our daughter were really selfish."

My heart clenched and I bit my lip.

"Did you want me to watch my child being bullied by others?"

A trace of surprise flashed across his face and then he changed the subject with a cold look.

"There was a very important party next month and you and Charlotte needed to attend together."

I paused, shook my head and said, "I couldn't go."

After all, next month, I would no longer be his wife as he wished.

"Why couldn’t you go?"

David frowned and then he seemed to understand something.

"Was this it because Charlotte said bad things about Jessica, so I gave her a little lesson and you were giving me a face now?"

"Besides, I told you on the first day of our marriage that I had someone I liked. Don't forget it."

My heart felt like it had been stabbed and waves of continuous pain emerged. Ten years ago, when my mother told me that David and I were engaged, I had been ecstatic because I had had a crush on him since I was a child. But on the happiest day, David had given me the heaviest blow.

"I had a lover, but she was just an ordinary girl from an ordinary family, so I couldn’t marry her."

That night, he had been drunk and stared at me coldly.

"I would control the Yates Family within ten years and then no one could stop me! So don’t expect me to fall in love with you. We would automatically divorce after ten years."

That night, I had signed the contract but cried all night in the cold yard. In the second week of our marriage, Jessica boarded a plane to a foreign country because of a quarrel with David. So, he went on to find her.

At that time, David didn’t go home all night and when he came back, he was always drunk and treated me like nothing. Until that night, he came back drunk again and hugged me passionately. But when he kissed me on the bed, he called Jessica’s name over and over again.

"Jessica, I wouldn’t let you marry anyone else! You could only be mine!" I cried under him with tears, nails dug into my palms and blood dripped into the sheets.

That was our first night, but David frantically called out another person’s name all night. When I woke up the next day, David saw my red and swollen eyes. He was stunned for a moment and finally got out of bed without saying a word.

I also pretended that nothing had happened, prepared breakfast and work documents for him and sent him out to work. Since then, I had been more considerate.

David was tired and had a stomach disease, so I learned about healthy food and prepared his three meals in person. He was under great pressure at work, so I took the initiative to give up my career, became his subordinate and took on the most tiring work.

Later, we had a daughter and gradually, David seemed to treat me as his wife.

David began to bring me various gifts when he came back from a business trip. He would bring me a glass of milk when I couldn’t sleep. He would even accompany me and my daughter to watch the stars on the terrace late at night.

His hot body temperature covered me from behind like a close lover.

Gradually, it seemed as if we had never signed any divorce agreement. I had naively thought that he might have really fallen in love with me. But more than three months ago, Jessica suddenly returned to the UK with her adopted son, Gregory.

David returned to her side as soon as he heard the news. He spent her birthday with her and accompanied her and Gregory to watch the meteor shower.

He even gave up an important business trip just because Jessica said, "I had a nightmare … "

When I saw David letting his daughter suffer such torture for Jessica, I woke up. He had never loved us, his wife and daughter. I gave everything for him, but it couldn’t match the look of his first love. The dream was over and it was time to leave.

"Remember to dress Charlotte nicely when the time comes. Don’t embarrass me and the Yates Family."

David's voice pulled my thoughts back and I looked at him in a daze.

Didn’t he remember that we automatically canceled the engagement in half a month?

###Chapter 2

In the past ten years, the closer I had gotten to the day when the contract expired, the more afraid I had been, fearing that he would abandon me without hesitation when the deadline came. But as the date approached, David never mentioned it.

Just when I had hesitated about whether to take the initiative to ask for a divorce, David's phone suddenly rang with a series of unique ringtones. I had known that he had set it up for Jessica, to ensure that he could receive her call as soon as possible.

As soon as the call connected, Jessica's crying voice came from the other end and David's face suddenly changed.

"Don’t worry, I’ll be there soon."

David rushed out while speaking. Because he had been too anxious, his shoulder had hit me heavily. I had hit the wall and felt dizzy from the back of my head. But David had ignored it and disappeared quickly.

Half a day later, I recovered and felt a big swelling on the back of my head. I went back to the room silently to apply medicine to myself and tried my best to endure not crying.

I had stayed by my daughter's bed, staring at her sleeping face in the darkening sky, until a burst of laughter came from the yard.

"David, fortunately you arrived in time and rescued me from the broken elevator. Otherwise, the baby might have miscarried."

Through the window, I saw David holding Jessica's hand and holding Jessica's adopted son with his other strong arm.

He kissed her forehead like kissing his favorite little girl.

"With me protecting you and your son, you never have to be afraid."

I noticed that the boy, who was about the same age as Charlotte, had a pair of emerald green eyes that were almost the same as Jessica's. He was wearing a wellmade tailored clothes, from head to toe, all of them were luxury brands.

My daughter had grown up so big, but she had never worn any luxury goods, just because David always said that he didn’t want others to think we were extravagant.

Jessica's voice came again, "Do you really want us to move in? What if Catherine is angry? I don’t want to destroy your relationship."

David paused, his eyes moved slightly and then he said, "She had no right to say no! As long as I was here, this was your home with the children."

I grabbed my clothes tightly, laughed at myself and retracted my gaze.

Soon, the familiar footsteps came upstairs. David walked into the house and threw a green skirt into my hand.

"This was for Charlotte. Didn’t she like green the most?"

But my daughter liked blue and hated green the most. He hadn’t understood it at all after seven years. I stared at the skirt without saying anything. David’s face showed a trace of confusion and then he seemed to understand something.

He hugged me from behind and kissed my hair gently.

"I knew I had neglected you and our daughter during this period. I would make it up to you."

"Jessica had just returned to the UK and had no place to live. I would take her and Gregory over and let them live in our house for a while."

As my arms tightened, a strong perfume smell came from his body, which made me want to vomit. I pushed him away and smiled coldly.

"Whatever, let whoever you love live."

My coldness made David frown unhappily and suddenly, a unique ringtone came from his waist.

He immediately loosened his arms around me and answered the phone.

"I had work."

He turned around, with an irrepressible smile on his face and walked out quickly.

Half an hour later, I received a message from David on my phone.

"Bring me a box of stomach medicine to Yates Club."

Knowing that he had stomach problems, I didn’t doubt him. When I rushed to the familiar door of the box, I saw through the crack in the door at first glance that in the dim space, Jessica was sitting on David's lap and the two of them were intimately entangled like an inseparable vine.

Several of David's buddies were there.

Suddenly someone asked, "Now Jessica is back with you and she is pregnant with your child. What if Catherine finds out?"

David frowned slightly and then I heard him sneer.

"She had been like a dog to me since high school. She couldn’t even be forced to leave. So what if she knew?"

###Chapter 3

A burst of laughter almost overturned the roof.

Only one man stared at Jessica on David's legs and asked disdainfully, "Catherine had devoted a full ten years to you. You treated her like this for the woman who had abandoned you in the past. It was too heartless, wasn’t it?"

The next second, the man was hit hard in the face by David.

"I didn’t allow anyone to say that about Jessica! She had been forced to do it in the past. Her parents had married her to someone else, but she never consummated the marriage with that incompetent old man!"

Back then, David had no say in the Yates Family. He had had an elder brother with outstanding abilities. He had thought Jessica left because of jealousy.

But he hadn’t known that it was when Jessica found out that he was not the first heir of the Yates Family that she had left him without hesitation and went abroad.

After I had married David, in order to help him, I had accompanied clients to discuss business and drank so much that my stomach was perforated. I had attended every important meeting with a high fever and negotiated countless big deals.

I had even worked overtime for several weeks while pregnant, just to let him attend the international industry summit with a presentation ...

Over time, his parents had finally favored him. Ten years later, when he had finally taken control of the Yates Corporation business empire, she came back. And I was still just a bootlicker who came and went at his call, a complete joke in his eyes.

I felt a sharp pain in my chest and I instinctively hid in the corridor next to me. In order to protect Jessica, David had abandoned his usual calmness and his furious look with red eyes made everyone in the box dare not breathe.

Then, he picked up Jessica, who was crying in grievance and just as he reached the door, he stopped.

"None of you were allowed to say a word in front of Catherine!"

His voice was cold and firm as he said, "You must not let her know that the child in Jessica's belly was mine."

Then, he had hugged his crying mistress and left.

But where he couldn’t see, Jessica had cast a smug and arrogant look at me. I finally understood that the text message had been sent to me by Jessica on his phone so that I could see it all. I had walked on the street in a daze for a long, long time.

When I got home, I was stopped by Jessica in the corridor.

"Did you know? Every year on my birthday, he flew to accompany me just to give me a gift. Last year it was a Chanel necklace and the year before it was the latest limited edition Patek Philippe watch …"

"Those were all the styles I mentioned on social platforms that I liked and he actually remembered them all the time."

"But I had deliberately gotten angry with him and thrown those gifts to him directly. In the end, I could get something more valuable than them. This man’s hot, vigorous, sexy body and his heart that was always in love with me and couldn’t stop."

My fingers suddenly tightened and my nails sank deeply into my palm.

I remembered clearly that on those days every year, David had said he was going on a business trip abroad even though I didn’t see any arrangements on his work schedule.

Last year, he had brought a Chanel necklace. The year before, an expensive Patek Philippe watch …

I had been so happy that I put them all in my cabinet and couldn’t bear to wear them. But it turned out that he gave them to me after Jessica didn’t want them anymore.

Jessica continued to hurt my eardrums, "Also, eight years ago on Christmas, I had a big fight with my thenhusband and he actually flew over overnight and stayed outside my house in the snow for a whole night."

I remembered that Christmas Eve. David had asked me for sex many times, contrary to his usual behavior and I had thought he finally started to fall in love with me.

When I woke up the next day, the pillow had already been cold and he had said he was on an urgent business trip and I hadn’t doubted it at all. It was also on that night that we had a daughter …

Now, I finally knew that David had forgotten to give me the contraceptive pill that day, just because he had been in a hurry to see Jessica?!

###Chapter 4

Jessica raised a thick stack of letters in her hand,

"Over the years, I had deliberately not contacted him. But he had never forgotten me for a day and wrote me love letters every day, even though I never replied."

I felt breathless. How many late nights had I seen him writing in the study, thinking he was handling official business, so I made coffee for him and sent it in.

It turned out that he had been telling Jessica his heart. It turned out that from beginning to end, the heart I had thought was finally warmed up had never had me. I couldn’t listen anymore and suddenly wanted to shake her off and turn away.

But Jessica grabbed my wrist and a gleam of light flashed across her face.

"Catherine, what did you have to fight me?"

After saying that, she grabbed my hand and pushed it to her shoulder. Then, she screamed and fell to the ground. I looked at everything in front of me in shock and before I could react, my shoulder was hit hard by someone.

It was David. He rushed over and picked up Jessica, his eyes full of pity. "Jessica, are you okay?!"

Jessica buried her head in his shoulder sadly and cried aggrievedly, "I just wanted to explain to Catherine that there was nothing wrong between you and me, but she called me a shameless bitch and said she wanted to kill me."

Instantly, David yelled at me with red eyes, "Are you crazy? Jessica was pregnant! Why are you so vicious?"

"I didn’t … "

"Enough!" David interrupted my explanation.

"If anything happens to Jessica and her child, I will make you pay!"

After saying that, he ignored my lips that were difficult to open, hugged Jessica and ran out, shouting to the bodyguard, "Go to the hospital immediately!"

After a long time, I wiped away the tears of disappointment, slowly crawled upstairs and walked towards the bedroom. I began to pack my luggage silently, just waiting for the divorce agreement to take effect. Until the phone rang.

It was David who called me, "Come to Yates Hospital immediately."

I hurried to the hospital and saw David standing in the corridor from a distance and Jessica leaned on his arms, crying. My head suddenly shook and I felt dizzy. Now, they didn’t even pretend.

I walked over and moved my eyes away from David’s big hand holding Jessica’s shoulders with difficulty.

"David, what’s wrong?"

"Gregory suddenly suffered from renal failure and needed a kidney donation immediately."

I was stunned for a moment.

"So?"

"There was no suitable kidney source now," David said lightly. "I did a matching test and the result was a match."

My heart was suddenly tightened by someone and I looked at him in disbelief.

"You wanted to donate a kidney to him?! But this would have a lifelong impact on your body …"

"I called you here just to inform you that the operation required family members to sign."

I looked at him straight. Yes, now his wife was still me. But in his heart, his family members had always been the people he was holding in his arms now.

I bit my lips tightly to prevent others from seeing my red eyes.

"I’ll sign."

When I wrote my name, every stroke seemed to make my heart bleed.

David changed into a surgical gown and lay on the operating cart. I watched him being wheeled away from a distance and finally couldn’t help shouting to him, "David, the operation went well!"

He raised his head, his eyes moved slightly, but he just nodded.

When he disappeared in the operating room, my tears finally fell. Although I didn’t want to admit it, David’s love for Jessica was so deep that he could risk his future half of his life. I walked out of the hospital in a daze and took a taxi back home.

David didn’t come back that night and he didn’t come back for many days. But every day I could see David’s recent situation from Jessica’s circle of friends.

The operation was successful, but he ignored his wounds and was busy arranging the best ward for Jessica’s adopted son and even transferred top medical teams from all over the world, just for Gregory to recover soon.

For so many years, he had never been so considerate and thorough to his daughter. Even when his daughter had chickenpox and kept asking for her dad, he still hung up the phone and worked overtime in the brightly lit office. In the end, he just asked his assistant to send a toy to his daughter.

Jessica’s latest circle of friends was a photo posted in the morning. [I would never meet a man who loved us mother and son so much again.]

David leaned against the head of the bed, kissing her belly devoutly while receiving an IV and his handsome face showed a cherishing look that I had never seen before. My heart ached fiercely and tears fell on the screen of the mobile phone, blurring David’s gentle profile.

###Chapter 5

"Mum, was Dad on a business trip again?"

Suddenly, my daughter's voice at the door called me back to my senses.

I woke up at once. Told myself it didn’t matter. Although he didn’t love us, I would love my daughter and myself twice as much.

I opened my arms and hugged her as I answered, "Yes, baby, he was very busy at work."

A trace of sadness flashed across my daughter's eyes and she suddenly raised her little face and asked me, "Mum, were you leaving Dad?"

I was stunned. In fact, I had been so afraid that Charlotte would be hurt that I hadn’t figured out how to tell her about this yet.

I asked in a panic, "How did you know, baby?"

"That day, I heard you talking to a lawyer on the phone."

My daughter lay on my legs tightly, as if she were afraid of being abandoned by me, "Mom, I love you and I always want to stay with you forever."

Tears fell and I kept kissing her cute little face, "Of course, Mom would always love you."

After dinner, I packed Charlotte's luggage and coaxed my daughter to sleep. Suddenly, familiar footsteps came from downstairs, which seemed particularly hurried. Soon, David's face appeared at the door. He rushed in with a chill all over his body and grabbed my arm.

"Hurry up and let Jessica go! Just because I let her move in and I donated bone marrow to her adopted son, you kidnapped her?!"

David gritted his teeth, as if he wanted to bite me to pieces.

My arm seemed to be broken and I was in so much pain that I could not see anything, "I did not kidnap her!"

Ignoring my excuses and pleas, David dragged me to an amusement park and tied me to the bungee jumping machine that I was most afraid of. Soon, I was in the air and the air under my feet made my eyes black and my heart almost stop beating.

He stood below, staring at me with a more ferocious look than a beast, "Tell me now and I will let you down, Catherine."

"David, I really didn’t know where Jessica went! Please, don’t do this to me!"

But he didn’t believe me. On the contrary, he looked cold,

"This was your last chance, Catherine."

David had known that I was afraid of heights and that I didn’t dare to sit by the window even though it was just an office on the fifth floor. Now, he was going to use the method that I was most afraid of, regardless of my fear, just for his first love and their child.

I was weak all over as I told him, "I swear, I really didn’t know anything! I was scared, David!"

The next second, he turned around and made a gesture to the staff. Then, I felt a feeling of falling that was more terrible than hell. The moment I fell from the sky at high speed, the overwhelming darkness came and the appearance of this man finally became completely blurred and distorted.

Even if he didn’t love me, but I had never thought that he would treat me so coldly and cruelly.

Ten years of love was ultimately misplaced.

###Chapter 6

The smell of disinfectant pierced my nose and before my consciousness was completely restored, a man's low sigh came into my ears.

"You had been in a coma for two days."

It was David. He sat on a chair beside the bed, working on his mobile phone. Sensing my movement, a soft thing passed through his deep eyes.

David put down his mobile phone, picked up the steaming soup on the bedside table, scooped a spoonful and handed it to my lips. But I subconsciously closed my lips and even slightly turned my head away.

The softness instantly shattered, replaced by a diffuse coldness.

He tightened his fingers around the spoon handle and his voice sank, "Were you still making trouble? Catherine, I had taught you this lesson because you’d gone too far! You even taught my daughter to slander Jessica. I had been tolerant enough of you, don’t be ungrateful."

I stared at this face that had been filled with all my youth and love and the corners of my mouth pulled out an arc that I didn’t know whether it was mockery or selfmockery, "Yes, it was me who was vicious and jealous and I was deliberately trying to harm her! Are you satisfied with this answer?"

My eyes were uncontrollably sour, but I held back and didn’t let a single tear fall.

David looked at my red eyes and felt an inexplicable stab in his heart. He remembered that many years ago, when I had a high fever and curled up in his arms, I also looked at him with red eyes like this. At that time, the look in my eyes had been an inseparable dependence and admiration.

But at this moment, there was only desolation left.

A trace of guilt flashed through his eyes, but it was soon swallowed by the evil fire of disobedience.

"Catherine!" he raised his voice, eager to prove his correctness.

"Did you know that Jessica had nightmares every night after I rescued her? It was obviously you who caused her … why were you pretending to be a victim here?!"

It was useless to defend myself and it only added to the humiliation. I turned my head silently and looked at the sky outside the window. My disregard angered him and he was about to explode when his cell phone rang.

David quickly turned sideways, but I still saw the screen. Jessica was wearing almost transparent lace underwear, lying seductively on the big bed in the hotel. I didn’t know what was said on the other end, but David’s breathing became rapid.

And the corners of his mouth even raised an arc uncontrollably. He stood up suddenly and said, "I would pick you up when you were discharged from the hospital. When the time came, apologize to Jessica. She was softhearted. As long as you were sincere, she would forgive you."

Before he finished speaking, his tall figure had disappeared at the door of the ward.

The next day I was discharged from the hospital, but only the driver came to pick me up.

David called, "Today was Gregory’s birthday. He had suffered in an orphanage since he was a child. I was going to go to the amusement park with Jessica."

He seemed to remember something and added in a gentle tone of pitiness, "Don’t worry, I would bring gifts back for you and my daughter."

The time on the phone reminded me that today was also Charlotte’s birthday.

At the same time, it was the date when the divorce certificate between him and me took effect. Of course, he hadn’t remembered it. I hung up the phone silently, sent the driver away and went to get the divorce decree alone.

My fingertips stroked the two cold jetblack words of ‘divorce’, but my heart was calm without a ripple, as if it were just an insignificant document. When I returned to the villa, I found that David and his friends had not left the house yet.

"Where did you go? The driver said you didn’t let him pick you up."

He stood in the middle of the living room, looking at me in a straight suit.

Jessica, wearing an exquisite dress, held the equally welldressed Gregory, leaning against him like a little bird.

I opened my mouth, but before I could say anything, he suddenly raised his eyebrows and said, "Today was our wedding anniversary. Did you go out to prepare a gift?"

###Chapter 7

I was slightly startled and then suddenly realized. Today was indeed also our wedding anniversary. Every year in the past, this day had been the day I spent all my effort to prepare a gift for David even if he never took it to heart.

This year, why had he suddenly ‘remembered’ it?

Did David remember that today was the day when the tenyear contract came to an end and we legally terminated our relationship?

My thoughts were surging and in the end, I just clenched the judgment on my chest and nodded lightly, "Yes, I went to the mall."

A trace of satisfaction flashed across his eyes and the corners of his lips curled slightly, "Well, then I’d take Jessica and Gregory out first. When I came back in the evening, I’d accompany you ... to celebrate."

"Well."

My voice was cold.

The butler reminded David carefully, "The amusement park had been booked as you ordered. Miss Charlotte had been talking about wanting to play the carousel. Did you want to … "

David hesitated for a moment, then looked at me, "Then you go and call Charlotte … "

Before he finished speaking, Jessica trembled suddenly, grabbed his arm tightly, tears in her eyes and trembled in fear, "David, I was afraid … what if Catherine did something more terrible to me and Gregory in the amusement park?"

David's body stiffened and he hugged her tightly, "Okay, don’t take them. Let’s go."

He didn’t look at me again, hugged her with one hand and held her son with the other hand and walked toward the garage.

My heart was calm and I turned and went upstairs. My daughter was standing on the terrace on the second floor, looking at the black RollsRoyce carrying her father and other children out of the door.

I felt a sharp pain in my heart and I squatted down in front of her to explain to her, "Dad had something urgent to do, so—"

"It’s okay, Mum!"

But my daughter interrupted me and smiled sweetly at me sensibly, "I didn’t need Dad, it was enough to have Mum to celebrate my birthday with me!"

My eyes were warm as I said, "Okay, Mom would make the baby the happiest little birthday star!"

I put on my daughter’s favorite princess dress and took her to my favorite Italian restaurant for a big meal. After lunch, both Charlotte and I went to visit the Museum Victoria and Albert that we both liked.

As night fell, I posted my daughter’s happy little face making a wish on the cake on Instagram.

[Happy seventh birthday to my little princess!]

Not long after I posted it, my phone vibrated wildly.

David’s voice was panic and condemnation, "Why didn’t you remind me that today was my daughter’s birthday?"

Was it necessary?

When my daughter was looking forward to her parents accompanying her to blow out birthday candles and open gifts, her father was spending millions to set off grand fireworks for someone else’s son in the amusement park.

The drones formed a huge confession, shining over the city.

[Jessica, the girl I love my whole life.]

Under the bright fireworks, he kissed Jessica passionately.

This scene was captured and broadcast live by countless cameras and instantly swept the hot searches on major platforms around the world.

#YatesCEOOnlyLovesHisWifeAndAdoptedSon

#DavidYatesShowsLoveWithMillionsofFireworks

I calmly retracted my gaze from the TV screen and my voice was as cold as ice, "David, Charlotte was your biological daughter, but did you need me to remind you of her birthday?"

This time, I hung up the phone without waiting for his answer.

"Beep … "

A mechanical busy tone came from my ears. I didn’t know why, but David’s heart was hit by that inexplicable panic again. I put the divorce decree in the drawer that David often used and wiped off the fingerprints of the password lock for myself and my daughter.

In the living room, those expensive gifts that he had thrown at random. Jewelry, bags, artworks ... I swept them into the trash can expressionlessly. Then, I held my daughter’s hand, dragged the luggage and got into a car waiting on the roadside.

The car started and I took off the ring on my ring finger and threw it out of the car window. Passing an intersection, a black RollsRoyce passed by us and drove in the opposite direction ...