Chapter 2

When I got to the hospital room, a woman named Maya was there.

"Why are you clinging to me? Don't you know I have a wife? You're so pathetic."

Jensen shoved her away, his face a mask of pure disgust.

Tears streamed down her face. She ran out of the room and bumped right into me.

She just shot me a look of pure, unadulterated hatred, as if her humiliation was somehow my fault.

I just ignored her and walked in.

When he saw me, his eyes lit up. "Aria! You're here!"

Aria. He hadn't called me that in a long time.

The doctor said the blow to his head had caused a bruise that was pressing on a nerve. He only remembered the past five years. Everything after that was a blank.

I wouldn't have even known he was in the hospital. As far as his new circle was concerned, I was already ancient history.

But he had been causing a scene, demanding to see me.

So his mother had called, and I had come.

"Aria, they said we're married!" His voice was filled with an almost childish excitement.

I didn't answer. He just ran to get me an apple. "Aria, it's washed! And it's sweet!"

Looking at the man whose world seemed to revolve around me, I just felt a cold, empty ache.

Five years ago, he would have done anything for me.

But this wasn't five years ago.

I took a step back. "Did they tell you we're getting a divorce?"

The smile on his face froze.

He started to panic, his words a jumbled, incoherent mess. "They're just trying to tear us apart!"

"Aria, you know I love you more than life itself... I would never divorce you!"

"They have to be lying!"

He saw my silence and took it as agreement. The smile returned to his face.

"They even found some ugly woman and said she was my girlfriend! She even had our divorce papers! As if! She can't even forge my signature properly. When I get out of here, I'm going to teach her a lesson..."

"Jensen," I said, rubbing my temples, "it's all true. You're the one who had the papers drawn up. You're the one who signed them. And that woman..."

"Impossible!"

He refused to believe it. He refused to believe that he was the one who had cheated, who had betrayed me.

He thought he loved me too much to ever do something like that.

I used to think so too.

He grabbed my hand, his grip tight. "Aria, there has to be a reason. Maybe... maybe I have cancer, and I'm just trying to push you away!"

"Yes, that's it! I'm going to have the doctors run a full scan!"

As he was screaming for a doctor, I glanced at my phone. It was time to pick up our daughter.

I pulled my hand from his grasp, and as he looked at me, his eyes full of a pathetic, wounded confusion, I said, my voice flat, "It's all true."

"You're the CEO of the Chen Corporation now. No one would dare to lie to you."