Chapter 4

"Get rid of that mutt today, or you can leave with it."

His face was ashen, every word absolute, leaving no room for argument.

I went to the room in silence to pack my things.

"Adrian, quick, talk her out of it. She's packing to leave."

"She won't leave me."

Adrian just stood there, a smirk of contempt at the corner of his mouth, his tone certain and dismissive.

When he'd first come home, I'd been terrified he would realize he was an android. I'd clung to him all day, never letting him do anything on his own.

I was terrified he would get hurt and discover the synthetic blue fluid beneath his skin. Only after the engineers upgraded him to pass as fully human did I begin to give him space.

Carrying the packed luggage, I rushed back to them despite the searing pain in my ankle.

"Where are my things?"

Fury burned on my face and my eyes were bloodshot as I screamed at the two of them.

"What things?"

He was visibly startled, his brows furrowing.

"My letters and my ring! Give them back to me!"

I grabbed his collar and held on for dear life.

"Sophie, you don't mean these, do you?"

Rachel slowly produced a stack of yellowed letters from behind her back, along with a tarnished ring.

"Adrian, this handwriting doesn't look like yours. Could these be love letters from another man?"

He snatched them away and flipped through the pages. His expression darkened with each letter, a vicious rage churning in his eyes.

The next second, he pulled a lighter from his pocket. With a click, a blue flame sprang to life.

"Sophie Weston, are you that desperate for a man? You've been seducing someone else behind my back."

All the color drained from my face. My knees gave way, and I collapsed onto the cold floor.

Nina whimpered in my arms, but I couldn't tend to her.

I just tilted my head up, eyes locked on the flame, and begged him over and over.

"Adrian, I'm begging you, please don't burn them."

Those love letters were from the real Adrian, written to me during our college years.

Back then, to win me over, he'd written me one letter every single day.

At the time, his right hand was injured, so he had painstakingly written every letter with his left.

And the simple ring was the first he'd ever bought me, paid for with money from several part-time jobs in college.

These belonged to Adrian and me alone.

I had only programmed this android with memories from after we graduated.

He knew nothing about any of this.

"Sophie, this is the first love letter I've written for you."

He opened one of the letters and scanned the crooked handwriting, his tone dripping with sharp sarcasm.

"Your lover boy's quite the romantic. Where is he now? Can he give you the life I've given you?"

I clamped my hands over my ears, desperate to block out the words cutting into me like knives.

After finishing the letter, a cold smirk spread across his lips. He flicked his wrist, and the blue flame ignited every last page.

"Don't burn them!"

My scream tore out of me, ragged and wet with sobs.

I reached for the burning pages, oblivious to the searing pain in my fingertips.

He frowned, watching me with cold detachment as I came apart.

"Once they are gone, I'll pretend this never happened. You'll still be Mrs. Hart."

Seeing me still plunging my hands into the flames, he grabbed me impatiently and pulled me back.

All I could do was watch as those love-filled letters turned to ash.

I stood up in a daze, my gaze fixed on the ring still in Rachel's hand.

"Give me back the ring!"

My voice came out raw and ugly.

Rachel was startled by the state of me and quickly handed the ring to Adrian.

He took it without a glance and threw it out the window.

"Enough! How long are you going to carry on over this junk? Is any of it worth more than being Mrs. Hart?"

I stared blankly at the pitch-black night outside. It felt like a piece of my heart had been ripped out.

How had it come to this?

The real Adrian would never have let me suffer even the smallest grievance.

This android's core personality had been modeled on the real Adrian's character.

Yet now he had become someone I no longer recognized.