Chapter 2

I watched Emma stare nervously at the staff member.

Her lips moved as if she wanted to say something, but in the end, she remained where she was without moving.

As I studied the subtle changes in her expression, I didn’t know whether to feel relieved or amused.

After hearing that a competitor had been in an accident, the media immediately smelled a headline, because Adrian’s shocking upset was already a rare occurrence, and an accident would draw even more attention.

Under persistent questioning from the reporters, the staff member reluctantly revealed:

“The matter is still under investigation, but based on the drone footage, the paraglider was purple, and the competitor involved should have launched from Lane Six.”

Emma visibly breathed a huge sigh of relief.

After all, everyone knew that I had always competed with a black paraglider.

What they didn’t know was that ten minutes before the competition, I discovered damage to my black canopy, so worried that it might affect my performance, I switched to my spare purple one.

Adrian had personally seen me put on that equipment.

Yet at that moment, he remained silent onstage, slowly rubbing the gold medal on his chest with his right hand as if lost in thought.

Because of the accident, the awards ceremony was interrupted, and Emma hurriedly left the venue with Adrian.

Once she got into the car, she took out her phone and called me.

But my phone remained switched off.

As I watched her brows slowly draw together, an indescribable feeling rose inside me.

I always turned off my phone while competing, but the moment each competition ended, I would switch it back on and let her know I was safe.

This was the only time nearly two hours had passed since the end of a competition without a single word from me.

Emma hesitated for a moment before opening SnapChat to send me a message.

[Where are you right now? I already explained that I had a reason, so stop taking this too far.]

Before she could send the message, however, Adrian leaned toward her.

He took her phone directly from her hand and gently coaxed her.

“All right, stop looking at your phone, because I booked a restaurant to celebrate, and we need to have a proper drink together later.”

Emma’s tightly knitted brows still did not relax.

“Where do you think Lucas went?”

“All I did was alter his tow device, and with his skill, he shouldn’t have ended up in last place, right?”

Adrian reached out and pinched Emma’s cheek, and nothing about his expression seemed unusual.

“Lucas might be angry, and since he couldn’t win first place, maybe he simply withdrew halfway through, so let’s give him some time alone.”

As he spoke, Adrian sighed and put on a pitiful expression.

“This is all my fault, because if I weren’t sick, you wouldn’t have tampered with Lucas’s tow device for my sake, so why don’t I go explain it to him later?”

After hearing him say that, Emma’s concern vanished completely.

“Don’t say that, because none of this is your fault, and I know that with your talent and hard work, winning a gold medal was only a matter of time!”

“Emma, you’re the only person in this world who treats me so well.”

Adrian wrapped his arm around Emma and drew her into his embrace while murmuring sickeningly sweet words of affection.

When I saw them cuddled together through the car window, all I felt was disgust.

Emma always said she had a low sex drive, and she rarely said anything romantic to me.

She said we weren’t hormonal teenagers and told me to stop being so clingy.

Yet with Adrian, she was behaving in a way I had never seen before.

All at once, I finally understood.

The problem had always been me, because she simply didn’t love me.

In the quiet car, Adrian suddenly asked, “Emma, if I hadn’t gone abroad back then, would you still have married Lucas?”