Chapter 5

I reached for another fork, twirled a few noodles around it, and took a bite. They were bland and tasteless.

Without looking up, I answered Jim.

"Since you have your wife to take care of you, why do you need me?"

Jim's face darkened instantly. The air around him seemed to turn cold.

"What wife? Rose, there is a limit to how jealous you can get. Those were just people we both know. Lucia and I were only putting on a show! Do you think I enjoy drinking? I only did it for you!"

I almost laughed.

He had looked like he was having the time of his life with Lucia. Now, he was standing here, acting like he was the victim.

I looked at Jim and slowly repeated, "For me?"

"Yes, for you!" Jim answered as if it were obvious. "Dad said he'd only make me the heir to the company if I married Lucia. That was the only way I could stay with you and get you transferred to headquarters. All of it is for you and your career!"

Lucia's brows tightened almost imperceptibly, and a flash of malice crossed her eyes, but she quickly nodded in agreement.

"Jim is telling the truth. You probably don't know this, but he deliberately rejected all your promotion requests over the years to protect you. He really went to great lengths for you."

I froze.

A chill suddenly raced from the base of my spine to my brain, cold enough to make me tremble.

All those years, I had pushed myself to the limit, convinced that if I worked hard enough, I could stand beside Jim as his equal. However, Lucia was now telling me that Jim had been throwing all my hard work away.

What about all those projects I had stayed up night after night to finish?

What about the contracts I had landed after drinking until I ended up with stomach bleeding?

What about all those vacations I had given up, the years when I barely got to see my own mother?

What had all of that been for?

My nose stung, and my eyes instantly filled with tears. My voice came out rough as I looked at Jim.

"Is that true?"

Jim did not look guilty in the slightest. Instead, he nodded as if he were waiting for me to praise him.

"Of course. Don't worry. Once you're Mrs. Carter, you'll be the wife of the Carter Group’s president. You'll have everything you could ever want. What do a few missed promotions matter?"

I suddenly found it all ridiculous.

Jim had always refused to make our relationship public. Even when we were supposed to get married, he had told me to invite only my closest relatives and friends and not make a big deal out of it.

No one even knew we were together.

So much for ‘protecting’ me. It had all been a lie.

He had simply wanted to keep me beneath him, to make me dependent on him and keep me circling him.

Only now did I realize that what I had once believed was love and sweetness had never been pure.

I shook my head. Finally, I said the words I had been keeping buried inside me.

"Jim, let's break up."

Jim's eyes widened.

He stared at me in disbelief, his lips trembling as if he could not get a single word out.

A flash of delight crossed Lucia's eyes. She immediately jumped in.

"Rose, you can't break up with Jim just because he's close to me! He really loves you. Even on our honeymoon, whenever he saw something unique, his first thought was to buy it for you!"

Even now, she had to bring up their honeymoon just to twist the knife.

'She really is disgusting,' I thought.

With Lucia backing him up, Jim quickly recovered. His anger returned even stronger, and his handsome face seemed to freeze over.

"Rose, you're really pushing this now, aren't you? Do you think you've got me wrapped around your finger? Now, you're talking about breaking up?

“Do you even have the right to break up with me? For ten years, you've eaten my food and used my money, and I even got you your job! What more do you want?"

The words came pouring out without hesitation, as if he had rehearsed them long ago.

That was how he really saw me.

All this time, he had believed he was the one who had sacrificed everything for me.