Chapter 4

"Sure," Samuel said with a nod.

He made a show of bunching up the bracelet to toss it to me, only to throw it hard against the floor instead.

The bracelet shattered. Even the emerald gemstones cracked into pieces.

I couldn't hold back any longer. With nothing left to lose, I swung my fist at Samuel. He didn't fight back. Instead, he screamed for Roxanne to help him, just as she came running in.

"Austin! Stop it!"

Roxanne and several other employees rushed toward me. After pulling me away from Samuel, she raised her hand and slapped me.

"Have you lost your mind? How dare you hit Sam?" she shrieked, her expression stormy.

Ignoring my stinging cheek, I pointed at the shattered bracelet on the floor and questioned, "Why did you give him the emerald bracelet?"

Roxanne froze for a moment before answering, "Sam has been having a lot of depressive episodes lately. Since the bracelet caught his eye, I lent it to him so that he could play with it for a while."

She knew very well just what that bracelet meant to me, so her tone was a lot less confident than usual.

"I'm sorry, Roxy. I didn't mean to do it," Samuel cried out pitifully. "I saw Austin rummaging through the office, so I wanted to stop him. Who knew he'd fly off the handle and start beating me up? That's when the emerald bracelet fell and broke."

Roxanne's heart ached to see him look so wronged.

She glared at me, her tone protective toward Samuel as she snarled, "The bracelet wouldn't have broken if you weren't in here trying to steal things! You've got no one but yourself to blame for what happened.

"To think you'd destroy your own dead grandma's belongings just to frame Sam. You're vicious! Why did I not realize sooner that you're such an unscrupulous guy?"

As always, no matter how ridiculous Samuel's claims were, Roxanne would always choose to believe him.

Therefore, I didn't bother saying anything. I simply bent down to pick up the fragments of the bracelet before turning to leave under Samuel's mocking gaze.

"Austin!" Roxanne called out to me, her tone rude and disdainful. "You can just glue everything back together anyway. Don't act like I've done something so terrible to you.

"Anyway, when you get back to the house, make sure you clear out the master bedroom. Sam doesn't like having other people's things in his room. I won't be going back for the next few days. Sam and I need to start working on getting pregnant."

Once she finished speaking, she left with Samuel.

I'd given up for good.

The real estate agent arranged a meeting with a buyer for me, and I signed the sale agreement on the spot.

Other than my own documents and paperwork, I didn't take a single thing from the house. They were all too revolting to me.

As promised, I followed Mom back to Rothspire. At the same time, I withdrew the resources I'd secretly been providing the Moores.

…

Third-Person POV

A week later, when a grinning Samuel arrived at the house to propose to Roxanne, Maureen finally discovered what was really going on. She froze in shock, her expression furious.

"Austin has already agreed to it, Mom!" Roxanne convinced her. "Besides, I'm only doing it for Sam's sake. Sam's grandpa wants him to have a child, so I'm just trying to help him out. Our families already have a close bond, and no other woman is worthy of having Sam's baby."

After hearing all that, Maureen hesitated for a while before giving her consent. "Since Austin has agreed to it, I guess it's fine."

They even had a formal engagement party to celebrate the occasion. Then, they made a grand return to Austin's old apartment, pulling up in a convertible that was decorated with a banner announcing that they were engaged.

However, when they arrived at the entrance to the apartment complex, the security guard stopped them.

"Your license plate number isn't registered in the system. Are you visiting someone?"

"Huh?" Roxanne sounded confused. "Didn't Austin Shaw, the owner of Block 8, Unit 502, add the license plate number to the system?"

She looked displeased.

The security guard replied, "According to the records, Unit 502 has been sold off. The owner isn't Mr. Austin Shaw, but Mr. Shane Lewis."

"That's impossible!" Roxanne's expression stiffened. "I'm his girlfriend! Why wasn't I informed that he's sold the apartment?"