Chapter 3

2

Louis and I were high school classmates. He was the star student in the honors class next door, always buried in his books.

I actually had a crush on him back then because he was handsome and had a clean, sophisticated aura.

However, he had a childhood sweetheart. The way they looked at each other was filled with hidden affection, so I kept my feelings to myself.

On the day the SATs ended, I didn't see my parents waiting for me. Instead, I saw our family driver with a look of deep sorrow.

He told me my parents had died in a car crash on their way to pick me up.

"I'm so sorry," he said. "I knew how important your exams were, so I didn't tell you immediately. I'm sure your parents would have wanted it that way."

I didn't blame him. He had seen me grow up and only wanted what was best for me.

That was my first experience with the sudden death of loved ones. To make matters worse, my grandmother blamed me for their deaths.

She called me a curse, saying if they hadn't been rushing to see me, they would still be alive.

Without her protection, I was quickly targeted by greedy relatives who wanted my parents' massive inheritance. They even orchestrated my kidnapping.

My grandmother hated me so much that she didn't try to save me. She left me to rot.

It was Louis who saved me. He happened to see the kidnappers pulling me into a car. Even after calling the police, he followed them.

The kidnappers were furious when they didn't get the ransom. They tortured me until I was barely alive.

I was lying in a cold, abandoned warehouse, certain I was going to die, when Louis's face appeared through a skylight.

He was like a beam of light in the darkness.

The ground around the warehouse was soft. He dug a tunnel inch by inch to get to me. Every time I told him to leave, he just shook his head.

His eyes were full of tears as he silently encouraged me to hold on.

Because of Louis, I gritted my teeth and survived the torture. I didn't want to let him down.

Eventually, Louis pulled me out of that warehouse. He carried me on his back as we fled into the woods with the kidnappers hot on our heels.

He tripped several times, but no matter how much I begged him to leave me, he refused.

We were lucky. Just as the kidnappers were about to catch us, the police finally found us.

Looking at his bloody, scraped hands and his injured leg, I felt a deep ache in my heart.

Louis just smiled and tried to comfort me.

After that incident, we became close and eventually fell in love.

I thought we would be together until the very end, but he left me far too soon.

I couldn't accept it, but his death was a cold, hard fact. For the sake of our children, I had to be strong.

I wanted to bury him at that warehouse where we truly connected.

Maybe Louis had forgotten, but that warehouse was where we first saw each other as kids. His parents had worked there.

One day, I had gone there with my parents on a business inspection and met him.

We were young then, but I never forgot that handsome boy. Later, my parents moved the business overseas, and the warehouse was abandoned.

For me, that place held all my pain, but it was also where I found my salvation.

It was a place of mixed emotions, but with Louis gone, it felt like the only place that held our unique history.