Chapter 2

I don't know how long I'd been lying in the hospital, but I was awakened by the heavy breathing of a man and woman on the ward's sofa.

"Heather, Natalie's still lying in the hospital bed. Let's go somewhere else."

"This is so exciting! Right in front of your own wife..."

I slowly opened my eyes.

A naked man and woman were entwined together.

I trembled with rage, finding it hard to believe.

This past year, Ethan had used his supposed germophobia as an excuse, and our intimate moments could be counted on one hand.

Even when going through the motions mechanically, he always frowned with disgust, calling me revolting afterward, like a bitch in heat.

He'd rush to the bathroom as if trying to scrub off a layer of skin.

Listening to Heather's passionate moans, the last trace of warmth remaining in my heart finally turned cold.

Ethan unconsciously glanced at me.

Only when he saw me motionless did he relax.

"This won't affect our child, will it?"

Heather's voice was sweet and soft: "I asked the doctor. Both your babies can handle moderate activity..."

I touched my flat abdomen, tears streaming down my face.

The two of them changed positions several times.

After more than ten minutes, they finally finished everything amid gasps and satisfaction.

After they left, I struggled to sit up.

Seeing the miscarriage report on the table, my whole body began to shake uncontrollably.

Ever since my uterus was injured, I'd undergone all kinds of treatments to conceive this child.

But ten years of feelings, in Ethan's eyes, ultimately couldn't compare to a few of Heather's fake tears and her lies that twisted the truth.

After sitting numbly on the sofa all night, I finally saw things clearly.

I picked up my phone and decisively replied to my college classmate's message: "I agree to the overseas study program you mentioned before. But I have one requirement: keep it completely confidential from my family."

Then I tore the miscarriage report into pieces and threw it in the trash.

Someone knocked on the door.

Ethan walked in and saw the report in the trash can.

"You know everything?"

He gently pulled me into his arms: "Natalie, we'll have another child. Heather's pregnant, so it's normal for her to be temperamental. Just bear with it."

Smelling the pungent perfume on him, I suppressed my nausea and pulled away: "What exactly do you take me for? Heather's a pregnant woman who can't be wronged, but what about me?"

Ethan's expression instantly darkened: "Stop making a scene, okay?"

The weather was hot, but my heart was ice cold.

That's right, in Ethan's view, when guests at the family banquet drowned my dog and I demanded justice, I was "making a scene"; when my intimate photos were spread by Heather and I warned her, I was "making a scene"; when I nearly died in difficult labor and interrupted his date with Heather to sign critical condition forms, that was also "making a scene."

I stared straight into his eyes, trying to find traces of the Ethan who had personally decorated the nursery during my first pregnancy, who had stayed up all night choosing names for the child.

But meeting his gaze, I saw only cold ice in Ethan's eyes.

I pulled at the corner of my mouth and spoke hoarsely: "Let's divorce, Ethan."