Chapter 1

When Selma Simon stepped out of the hospital, the sky was overcast, and rain seemed imminent.

She pulled her coat tighter around herself and was about to leave when a familiar figure caught her eye. Dressed in a black trench coat, Valerio Gould strode toward the hospital entrance with a petite woman in his arms.

The woman leaned against his tall, athletic frame.

"It's just bad cramps. We didn't need to come to the hospital."

"Of course, we did."

Valerio shook his head, his voice deep and resolute. "Watching you in pain hurts me more than it hurts you."

Looking down at her, he softened his expression with a tenderness Selma had never seen him show anyone else. "I'll rent out the entire building and have the staff cater exclusively to you."

The woman quickly shook her head.

"But if Selma finds out, she'll throw another fit."

Valerio's expression instantly turned icy, and his voice dripped with undisguised contempt. "I couldn't care less about her feelings."

With that, he carried the woman straight past Selma without sparing her a glance. Selma stood frozen, her heart tightening as though an invisible hand had seized it.

Valerio was the man she had loved for nearly her entire life, ever since she first met him at eight years old.

Shortly after moving in next door to the Gould family, Selma had laid eyes on the boy, who was three years her senior, for the first time.

He had stood in the courtyard wearing a crisp white shirt, playing the violin as the afternoon sunlight caught his eyelashes and made him look as though he had stepped straight out of a painting.

From that moment on, she became his shadow.

When she was eleven, she followed him to the public library, only for him to turn around and snap, "Selma, stop following me."

Two years later, on her thirteenth birthday, she spent an entire week writing him a love letter, only to watch him casually toss it into the trash.

Then, during the summer she turned fifteen, she got up early every morning to bring him breakfast, but he simply handed the food to a stray dog right in front of her.

By seventeen, she was still hopelessly devoted to him, secretly following him to a classical concert. When he caught her, he humiliated her in front of everyone by demanding, "Can you stop being so annoying?"

For years, nothing she did could soften his heart. Then, when Selma was nineteen, her parents died in a car accident while saving Valerio's parents, and everything changed.

On the day of the funeral, Valerio stood beside her and took her hand for the first time.

Later, the Gould family took Selma in and raised her, and their elders arranged an engagement between her and Valerio.

However, by that point, Maureen Dalton had already claimed a place in Valerio's heart. Selma would never forget his reaction when he learned about the engagement.

In a fit of fury, he trashed his entire study and yelled at his father, "I'm only ever marrying Maureen!"

Florian Gould was so enraged that he suffered a heart attack.

In the end, he forced Valerio to comply through a sheer ultimatum, leaving his son with no choice but to reluctantly agree to the engagement.

Over the years that followed, Selma wore the title of Valerio's fiancée while watching him shower Maureen with every ounce of tenderness he had never shown her.

Each time she witnessed their intimacy, the pain left her struggling to catch her breath, yet she couldn't bring herself to let go.

She loved Valerio too deeply, so much that even catching a glimpse of him from a distance was enough to fill her chest with warmth.

That was, until three days ago, when everything finally reached a breaking point. At an upscale cocktail party, Selma had accidentally spilled a glass of wine on Maureen's dress.

Valerio immediately assumed she had done it out of spite and, without giving her a chance to explain, deleted her from all his contacts on the spot.

That night, a torrential downpour battered the windows, and thunder shook the glass in its frames. Selma had been terrified of thunderstorms ever since her childhood, so she curled up beneath her covers and repeatedly sent Valerio friend requests, desperate for him to accept her again.

[Valerio, I was wrong. Please add me back, okay?]

[I'm sorry. I didn't mean to. I'm begging you.]

[I promise I won't ever get near her again.]

She spent the entire night sending one request after another, her messages shifting from desperate pleas to words typed in a state of numb exhaustion.

By morning, Valerio finally accepted her request, but instead of asking how she was doing, he sent her a cold, cutting message.

[Did you finally learn your lesson?]

Selma stared at her reflection in the mirror, taking in her ghostly pale face and red, swollen eyes. After everything she had endured for him, that was the moment she finally made up her mind.

She would wipe out every trace of her love for Valerio.

And so, she booked the love-eradication procedure.

...

On her way home from the hospital, Selma bought a plane ticket for a flight departing in seven days. Soon, she would be able to start a new life, and soon, she would finally stop loving him.

Once she returned home, Selma began gathering anything and everything connected to Valerio.

The little trinkets he had tossed her way, the photographs she had secretly taken of him, and even the pen he had left at her place...

All of it went into the trash, piece by piece, as she worked to rid herself of every reminder of him. She was halfway through clearing everything out when Valerio's parents suddenly walked in.

"Selma, what are you doing?"

Lynn Gould glanced at the belongings scattered across the floor with a puzzled expression.

Selma managed a tight smile.

"Just tidying up the room."

Not thinking much of it, Lynn took Selma by the hand and led her to the sofa.

"All right. We wanted to talk to you about setting a date for the wedding."

She pulled out a calendar and pointed to a date on the page. "How about the eighteenth of next month?"

Selma's fingertips trembled at the suggestion, but before she could respond, an icy voice echoed from the doorway.

"I object."

Valerio stood there, his features stern and chilling as he explained, "We have too many ongoing projects at the firm right now. I don't have time to plan a wedding."

Florian frowned at his son.

"Then when do you propose?"

"Five years from now."

"What? Selma has already waited three years since your engagement, and now you want her to wait another five? How do you expect people to look at her?"

"How else would they look at her? She's doing this to herself of her own free will."

Valerio's words pierced Selma's heart like a dagger.

Florian slammed his hand on the table in fury. "Valerio! Don't you dare cross the line!"

Yet Valerio remained expressionless, delivering each word with chilling precision.

"I've been hoping every day that she would call off the engagement, pack her things, and leave. Then I could finally stop dealing with her and her feelings for me!"

Selma listened in silence before a soft laugh escaped her lips.

Valerio had spent years wishing for her to give up on him and walk away, and now, at long last, his wish was about to come true.