Chapter 6

Sienna never expected her offhand answer during the street interview to attract any attention.

But thanks to her striking looks and calm, unbothered demeanor, the clip made it into the show's final cut.

It even gained a little traction on a local social media platform under the headline, “Beautiful Woman Claims She's Single.”

The comments were filled with people asking for her contact information and jokingly volunteering to date her.

When Sienna came across the video, she simply found it amusing. She scrolled past without giving it another thought.

That evening, she'd barely gotten home when the front door was suddenly thrown open.

Tristan stormed in, his face cold and his eyes dark with fury.

He slammed his phone onto the coffee table in front of her.

The screen was lit, paused on the interview.

“Sienna! What the hell is this supposed to mean?”

His voice trembled with suppressed anger as he pointed at the screen.

“What do you mean you don't have a boyfriend? Explain that to me!”

Sienna looked at the image of herself smiling and declaring she was single.

Then she looked at Tristan's furious face.

All she felt was an overwhelming sense of absurdity and exhaustion.

She picked up his phone and handed it back to him.

“That's not me,” she replied calmly. “It must be someone who looks a little like me.”

“Do you think I'm an idiot?!”

Tristan knocked her hand aside.

The phone fell to the floor, its screen shattering.

“Do you seriously expect me to believe that excuse? Sienna, what the hell are you trying to pull?

“Wasn't a whole month of this passive-aggressive nonsense enough? Now you're going around telling everyone you're single?”

Sienna looked at the shattered phone on the floor.

Suddenly, she remembered something that had happened eight years earlier.

It had been Christmas.

Back then, she and Tristan had been together for just four months, and their relationship had seemed relatively stable.

Tristan's company was hosting its annual holiday party, and she'd been invited as his date.

At one point, she'd stepped away to use the restroom.

On her way back, she'd happened to overhear Tristan giving a brief interview to a financial news outlet around the corner.

The reporter asked, “Mr. Lawrence, you've accomplished so much at such a young age. Since it's Christmas, do you have any special plans with your girlfriend tonight?”

Tristan had been drinking.

His tone was casual, with a hint of mockery.

He looked into the camera, gave a faint smirk, and said, “My girlfriend? She's gone overseas. I'm waiting for her to come back.”

Those words hit Sienna like a bucket of ice water.

She'd been standing just a short distance away and had heard every word.

It felt as though someone had carved a piece out of her heart.

The pain was so intense that she could barely breathe.

With tears in her eyes, she'd waited until the interview ended before confronting him with the video she'd secretly recorded.

Tristan had merely frowned.

“You misheard. The reporter was asking about my ex-girlfriend. I said my ex went overseas.”

“But you clearly said 'girlfriend'!”

Sienna had tried to show him the video through her tears.

But Tristan snatched her phone away.

“Can you stop making a big deal out of nothing, Sienna? The video's blurry, and you can barely hear anything. What does that prove?

“I told you I was talking about my ex-girlfriend, so that's who I was talking about! If you don't believe me, there's nothing I can do!”

With that, he'd turned and walked away.

Leaving Sienna standing there alone, crying until she completely broke down.

She'd loved him so much back then.

Even though his words had devastated her, she'd ultimately chosen to believe his flimsy excuse.

She'd swallowed all her hurt and resentment and dealt with the pain on her own.

But now the tables had turned.

This time, Tristan was the one demanding answers.

And Sienna could finally give him a taste of his own medicine.

She looked at him and sighed helplessly.

Then, imitating the exact tone he'd used with her all those years ago, she said slowly and deliberately,

“That's really not me. It's just someone who looks like me. If you don't believe me, there's nothing I can do.”