Chapter 6

When Olivia opened her eyes again, she found herself lying in the hospital bed, her wound throbbing faintly.

"You're awake." Caleb's voice rang out from beside her. His eyes were bloodshot, with dark circles under them. He looked exhausted.

"Does it hurt?" With that, he reached out to feel her forehead, but she instinctively backed away.

Caleb hesitated before saying softly, "Get some rest. I'll call the doctor."

She watched him walk away in silence.

Next to her, the nurse spoke up. "When they brought you to the hospital, Mr. Jebb was so worried that he brought in the best doctors in all of Joltbury.

"His hands were even shaking when he signed the paperwork. While you were unconscious for the past two days, he stayed by your side the entire time. He even cleaned you up and changed your bandages himself. You guys must really love each other."

Olivia lowered her gaze.

Loved each other?

If they really loved each other, they wouldn't have ended up this way.

Sometimes, Olivia found Caleb rather strange. Whenever they were at each other's throats, he never held himself back, acting as if he wanted to be the one to kill her.

But whenever something actually happened to her, he looked more worried than anyone else.

It had happened a year ago, and now it was happening again.

But Olivia wasn't the same person she had been a year ago.

Over the next two days, Caleb never left her side. She tried to make him leave, but he pretended not to hear her. She deliberately smashed the cup, but he grabbed her hand and asked if she was hurt.

As Caleb wiped Olivia's body, she struggled and told him to get out of her room, but he only held her tighter.

"You can be mad at me all you like. I don't care if you tear this entire room apart. But if you aggravate your wound, it's only going to hurt more. Don't be so stubborn, Livvy."

Olivia froze.

Livvy.

She hadn't heard Caleb call her that in years.

While Olivia was distracted, Caleb changed her bandages and left the hospital room.

She didn't care where he had gone off to. She pulled out her phone and started responding to messages from her team. She had planned to make further improvements to the drug efficacy report and the proposal to bring the new drug to the market.

But not long after, Caleb walked into the hospital room and took the phone from her, saying gently, "You need to rest. You can always work later."

Olivia scowled. "Give it back to me."

"You need to rest," Caleb repeated, leaving no room for discussion.

Olivia was exhausted. Since it was getting late, she couldn't be bothered to fight with him anymore and lay on the bed.

Caleb finally gave her phone back to her and even carefully tucked the blanket around her.

Perhaps she really was exhausted. She slept soundly through the night.

It wasn't until noon the next day that Olivia's phone rang. She finally stirred awake and realized that one of her team members was calling.

There were 12 missed calls.

Olivia froze for a moment before quickly taking the call.

"Bad news, Olivia! Shannon's team presented a drug efficacy report and a commercialization plan at today's meeting at Jebb Corporation. They're exactly the same as ours!"

Olivia's eyes widened in shock. Those formulas and data came from two whole years of research she and her team had conducted. How dare Shannon steal her research?

Olivia immediately hurried to Jebb Corporation. The moment she stepped out of the elevator, she saw Shannon at the corner of the hallway.

Shannon looked at her smugly. "Olivia? What brings you here? The meeting just ended. Everyone said my team's new drug development proposal has amazing potential. If we submit it, we'll definitely win."

Olivia looked at her coldly. "That's my research."

"I know." Shannon shrugged. "A few days ago, I casually mentioned to Caleb that I wanted to have a career of my own too. Guess what happened?

"He immediately set up a research team just for me. He even gave me your research materials!" Shannon burst into laughter.

Olivia's mind went blank, and a chill ran through her.

Seeing her pale face, Shannon smiled even wider. "Don't worry, Olivia. You worked so hard on it, didn't you? I'll pay you for your hard work."

With that, she slowly pulled a ten-dollar bill from her wallet. "Will ten dollars be enough?"