Jade's face was flushed—not with embarrassment, but victory. "Do you really think a marriage license can tie you and Connor down forever?"
She stepped closer, her tone dripping with cruelty.
"Connor said this charade won't last more than three months. Once he secures the company shares, he'll divorce you."
"I know," I replied calmly.
Jade froze. She hadn't expected agreement.
It wasn't just that Connor wanted to divorce me—I didn't want him anymore, either.
"You've finally thought it through?" she sneered. "Or are you planning to make another scene and slit your wrists for sympathy?"
To force Connor into this marriage, I had attempted suicide four times.
Jacob Delgado and my parents couldn't bear to watch me suffer, so they'd used the Delgado Shares as leverage, forcing Connor to bow his head.
I offered a bleak smile. "You and Connor are the perfect match, Jade. I'm just the clown."
Jade let out a sharp, cold laugh. Then her hand flew across my face.
"Don't think playing victim will get us to forgive you!"
I wiped blood from the corner of my mouth. "I wouldn't dare."
I never dared hope for anyone's forgiveness. I only wanted my Wanwan to live.
"However," I added, my voice steady, "for these next three months, Connor is mine. What do you have to say about that?"
Jade's eyes reddened with rage. She burst into tears and fled the room.
Connor instinctively tried to rush after her, but his injured leg failed him. He couldn't leave the bed.
I seized the moment. I pushed him back down, unraveled his silk tie, and bound his wrists to the headboard.
I was about to "humiliate" him.
Connor roared, eyes bloodshot with fury. "Samantha, don't you find yourself disgusting?"
Disgusting?
Perhaps. In his eyes, I was soiled goods because I had slept with a stranger. But wasn't that the very "favor" he and Jade had orchestrated for me?
After he finished—wearing an expression of utter torment, as if he were a flower being trampled by a beast—I calmly helped him pull up his pants.
He kept cursing me. I turned a deaf ear.
I picked up the insulated lunch box from the table, sat by the bed, and brought a spoonful of soup to his lips.
Connor shoved my arm violently, knocking the thermos over. Hot soup splashed across my chest.
I blinked, feeling the heat soak through my clothes as tears rolled silently down into the dark, wet collar of my shirt.