Chapter 1

Hearing that, five-year-old Charles Beaumont froze. It was obvious he had not expected me to say something like that.

Just then, a familiar voice rang out from the stairway.

"Why is Charles crying?"

I turned around, momentarily stunned.

Liam Beaumont, the brilliant genius I had once secretly admired, was walking upstairs in a sharply tailored suit.

Ten years really had passed. The youthful softness between his brows was gone, replaced by the calm maturity of a grown man.

Charles immediately burst into louder sobs, pounding on the door as he cried.

"Dad! Mom's gone crazy and hit me! Hurry and save me!"

Liam frowned and pulled the door open. "What happened?"

The moment the door opened, Charles shot straight into his arms, wailing dramatically.

"Dad, I hate Mom! I just didn't want her disturbing you and Mandy, but then she got angry and hit me and locked me in the dark room!"

Liam looked at me in shock.

The eyes that had been so full of tenderness yesterday now held nothing but coldness and mockery.

"Stella Tanner, before this, you nearly burned Mandy to death. Fine. But now you're even hitting your own son? What the hell is wrong with you?"

There was disappointment mixed into his icy voice, and my heart trembled with hurt.

During the four hours I had been locked in that dark room, I had pieced together who Mandy Coot was from the notes saved in my phone.

She had been Liam's university classmate. In their sophomore year, he suffered a heart attack, and she was the one who saved him.

They were obviously very close. That much, I could understand.

However, from the missing ten years of my memory, it seemed that whenever Mandy was involved, Liam would always take her side without hesitation. Toward the future version of me, all he ever seemed to have were accusations and reprimands.

And yet I was his wife.

The woman he had married openly and properly, the one he once promised to protect for the rest of his life.

Charles pointed at me angrily.

"Bad woman! You hit me just now! Apologize to me right now, or I'll make Dad kick you out!"

I glanced at him and almost laughed from sheer disbelief.

Then I spoke slowly, word by word.

"First: this little idiot locked me in a dark room for four hours. I'm his mother. Was I wrong to discipline him?

"Second: I have never gone crazy. And what happened back then with Mandy nearly dying in the fire had absolutely nothing to do with me."

During the first year of our marriage, Liam adored me completely. Everyone envied me for marrying such a perfect husband.

However, Mandy accidentally ruined one of my paintings for a competition. That same night, the guest room she was staying in mysteriously caught fire.

The security footage showed that I was the only person who had entered her room, and the fire started right after I walked out.

But only the future version of me knew the truth.

That day, a servant had called me there.

After the fire, the servant vanished without a trace, and no matter how hard I tried, I could never prove my innocence.

Liam never believed I was innocent either.

Still, he suppressed the incident and kept it from becoming a public scandal.