Chapter 1

Natalie's Point of View

Zachary Lawson and I grew up together. Our families were evenly matched, and we were childhood sweethearts everyone admired.

Everything changed in our senior year of high school, when a transfer student named Vivian Larson joined our class. She seemed delicate but surprisingly strong, and Zachary couldn't help but feel the need to protect her.

Three months later, Zachary said, "Natalie, let's call off our engagement. Vivian needs me. She can't survive without me."

I couldn't accept it and made such a scene that everyone found out about it. In the end, Zachary was placed under house arrest by his family, while mine used their influence to transfer Vivian to a better school in another city.

Yet a month later, Vivian jumped to her death after enduring relentless bullying at her new school.

When Zachary found out, it was as if his soul had died with hers. He stopped speaking and refused to eat.

Overwhelmed by love and guilt, I left everything behind to stay by his side. I spoke to him gently each day, fed him bite by bite, and begged him to keep living.

Two months later, after mapping out our entire itinerary, I took him to the snow-capped mountains he had longed to visit.

When the first rays of sunlight broke through the clouds and lit up the mountain peaks, the golden glow seemed to reach the emptiness in his eyes.

He slowly turned his head and looked at me for the first time in ages, a gentle smile forming on his lips. "Natalie, thank you for everything you've done."

At that moment, I thought that I had lifted the shadows from him and brought back the young man I once knew.

Later, we got married and had a pair of adorable children.

But when the children were ten years old, I fell seriously ill and was paralyzed in bed. I couldn't even turn over on my own.

That very day, Zachary walked into our home holding hands with Vivian, the same woman who was supposed to be dead.

I never expected she would still be alive. What broke me even more was that my own children ran happily into her arms, cheerfully calling her "Mom". I trembled in shock, unable to utter a single word.

Zachary looked down at me, his gaze cold and cutting. "Your children died the day they were born. These two are Viv's and mine. You were nothing more than a nanny who raised them for over a decade.

"You destroyed Viv's life and mine. Your family abused their power and drove her to despair. Even though you repulse me, I forced myself to marry you just for this moment."

He took a deep breath and said coldly, "You won't be alone. Your parents will join you soon. Everyone who separated Viv and me will pay. None of them will get away."

After I died, he manipulated the system to have both our parents sent to prison, where they later died under suspicious circumstances.

When I opened my eyes again, I was back on the day he confessed that he liked Vivian.