Chapter 1

The moment Mom's EKG flattened into a straight line, my own heart felt like it had stopped alongside hers.

The doctor pulled off his mask, sweat still on his forehead, as he tried to console me.

"We did everything we could, Allen. I'm sorry for your loss."

Everyone looked at me with sympathy, but even more so with pity. After all, everyone knew that the only surgeon capable of operating on Mom was Daniella Dooley. And right now, she was busy comforting a junior of hers.

Mom lay in the hospital bed, her eyes tightly shut and face drained of all color. I couldn't bring myself to look for long. I wiped away my tears and, with shaking hands, called Daniella yet again.

When the cold, automated voice hit my ears, I couldn't hold it in any longer. I threw myself over Mom's body, weeping hysterically and begging her to open her eyes and look at me.

I cried until my legs gave out, and I ended up kneeling on the cold, hard floor.

Through a blur of tears, I noticed the framed photo on the bedside table. It was a photo of Mom, me, and Daniella.

That was the first time I brought Daniella back to meet Mom. The always frugal woman had specially hired a professional photographer for the occasion.

I forced myself to stay upright and bring Mom to the crematorium. I watched her turn into ashes, reduced to a tiny porcelain urn I could hold in my hands.

…

After the funeral, Daniella finally called back.

"Allen Hensley, what are you doing? Why aren't you replying to my messages?"

I didn't even have the strength to speak.

She continued to vent for a little longer before hanging up.

I tapped open her messages. There was only a short one.

"Jack ran into a bit of a situation and is in a bad mood. I'll come back after I handle it. Have your mother wait a bit longer."

The timestamp showed that it was from two days ago. By then, Mom was already dead.

As a sharp pain cut through my numb chest again, I pulled up Jackson Bleeth's social media.

In just three short days, he had uploaded no less than 10 posts—from bragging about how Daniella had backed him up when something went wrong with a surgery of his, to talking about how she'd taken time off so she could take him to the beach. She did all that just to cheer him up.

Below the posts, comments from mutual friends were full of teasing, egging them on.

"Didn't someone say that her hands were far too precious to ever cook?"

"It's different this time."

My eyes burned when I saw Daniella's reply.

But of course. In everyone's eyes, Jackson and Daniella shared similar family backgrounds, the same interests, and even the same profession.

If Jackson hadn't gone abroad back then, the two of them would've been together publicly a long time ago.

I was merely a choice Daniella had resorted to out of necessity.

It was only after Mom's death that I truly understood something—a choice made out of necessity would always be the first to be abandoned.

With that thought in mind, I quickly typed a reply to Daniella.

"Daniella, the engagement is off. We're done."

Without waiting for a reply, I blocked her and deleted all her contacts. Then I returned to the apartment I'd shared with her for the past eight years and threw away everything related to her.

For eight years, my life had revolved entirely around Daniella. But after removing her from it, all that was left could fit into a single suitcase.

Holding Mom's urn close to my chest, I shut the door behind me without looking back.

Before leaving the city, I deliberately went to a monastery. Back when Mom first fell sick, I had donated half my savings to keep a perpetual candle burning there. Now, it was time to go back and show my gratitude.

What I didn't expect, however, was to run into Daniella and Jackson.

"Dani, you're really too good to me. I only mentioned it in passing, and you really brought me here to light a perpetual candle. I heard that it's really hard to light these here because there's a fixed slot. What if the original owner of the candle we just extinguished finds out and gets mad at us?"

Daniella patted his curly hair gently.

"Don't worry. You've got me."