Chapter 1

I had just picked up my passport when a long, well-defined hand suddenly snatched it out of my grasp.

“What are you looking for that you didn’t even notice I came back?”

My boyfriend, Hudson Chase, had just returned home. The tip of his nose was red from the cold. When he realized it was a passport, the faint smile on his lips disappeared, and his sharp brows knitted together.

“What do you need a passport for? Are you planning to run off overseas?” he said. “Haven’t I explained it to you? Lara’s family has been pressuring her. Registering the marriage with her was just to help her deal with them. After a while, we’ll quietly get divorced.”

I didn’t even look up. Keeping a cold expression, I snatched the passport back.

He rubbed his chilled fingertips together. In the past, whenever he came home, I would always ask if he was cold and pour him a cup of hot tea. Today, though, I was unusually distant.

He reached out and cupped my face. The coldness of his hands brushed against my skin as he forced me to look at him.

“Sophie, aren’t you being a little too jealous?” he said. “Think about how many people from high society were watching that day. If word got back to my dad, neither of us would come out of it well.”

I let out a self-mocking laugh. To him, I was nothing more than a pastime he couldn’t publicly acknowledge.

I pried his hand away, but he clung to me again. His icy fingers lifted my chin as he carefully examined the small scratch on my cheek, his voice full of concern.

“Do those bodyguards have a death wish? They turned my Soph into a little stray cat. I’ll dock all their pay later.”

Here it was again. In the past, no matter how angry I was, I would eventually forgive him after he pestered me, but not this time.

Seven days ago, at the engagement party, the bodyguards—under Hudson’s orders—had thrown me out of the hotel and shoved me to the ground.

“Who do you think you are?” one of them sneered. “Mr. Hudson and Ms. Lara are a perfect match. I’ve seen plenty of gold diggers like you.”

People passing by pointed and mocked me. They laughed at how someone perfectly capable of working had instead knelt in front of a man, begging for money. I had long since lost all my dignity.

When I snapped back to the present, Hudson, seeing that I was still upset, finally brought out his trump card. He carried over a box of caviar from the doorway.

“These are for your grandma,” he said. “And don’t use that story about her needing surgery to trick me again just to get my attention. It’s not interesting.”

My grandma and I had depended on each other for years. She had said she wanted to witness the day Hudson and I registered our marriage so she could give us her blessings. However, when she saw Hudson registering his marriage with another woman, she collapsed on the spot.

The doctor told me that as long as I could come up with a hundred thousand dollars for the surgery, my grandma would still have a chance to live.