Chapter 3

That night, I tossed and turned in my sleep, trapped in a dream that seemed to last forever.

In it, our entire apartment building had collapsed, and Ryan was still a teenager. His eyes were red and swollen as he wrapped his arms around me and sobbed, "Nathan, I don't have Mom or Dad anymore. You're the only person I have."

I couldn't speak. I could only choke back my own sobs as I stepped forward and held him tightly.

An earthquake had taken our home and our parents. After that, we only had each other. We leaned on one another through high school and college, doing whatever we could to survive.

When I accepted a job offer and moved to Bayview, I met Nora.

Three years later, when Nora and I decided to get married, Ryan went quiet for a moment on the phone.

When he finally spoke, his voice was hoarse. "Either way, I'm coming over. I need to meet her in person. If she ever treats you badly, she'll have to answer to me."

He stayed at my place for three months after he arrived. During that time, he never spoke to Nora when they were alone. Even when the three of us ate together, he always kept at least six feet between them. I laughed and told him he was being ridiculous, and he never explained himself.

On the day he moved out, he hugged me and said with a smile, "She's a good catch, and it wouldn't be appropriate for me to keep living here. Even if I'm your best friend, there are lines I can't cross."

Later, Nora described him in one sentence: "He knew where to draw the line."

Because of that, Ryan eventually became Nora's trusted right-hand man at work.

His exact words to me when he was hired had been, "As long as I'm around, no other man is getting close to her."

And yet now, the very person who had once sworn to protect my relationship was the one who drove a wedge between Nora and me—and ultimately pushed me out of it.

I woke to the sound of my phone ringing. It was 3:00 am, and the call was from the city hospital.

"Is this Mr. Reed? Mr. Ryan Bennett lost consciousness on his way home. He listed you as his emergency contact."

"Okay. I'm on my way," I said, already reaching for my jacket.

My head was spinning. Before I could even process what I'd heard, I was already on my way to the hospital.

The hallway lights were painfully bright, and my hands wouldn't stop shaking as I ran to his room. Then, through the glass window, I saw Ryan.

He was propped up against a pillow. Sitting beside him was Nora, who should have gone home hours ago, but she was still there.

Her coat was draped over the headboard. Her hair hung loose around her shoulders, her eyes red and swollen, her face etched with worry and panic. She looked nothing like the composed professional who had come to see me a few days earlier.

"Go home." Ryan turned his face away, his voice muffled. "Nathan is home alone. You shouldn't leave him by himself."

Nora picked up the bowl of stew from the table, and her voice softened as she coaxed him. "Just take a few sips, and I'll leave. You haven't eaten anything tonight. You passed out and fell. I'm worried about you."

My fingers slowly curled into fists.

Suddenly, I remembered lying alone in my hospital bed, sending her message after message. Then came the long wait. Hours later, her only reply finally appeared. "Okay. Got it."

Ryan's eyes slowly reddened. His voice trembled as he said, "We shouldn't be doing this."

Nora said nothing.

The next second, the bowl slipped from her hands and shattered across the tile floor.

Ryan's eyes were bloodshot as he shouted, "I told you to leave! Why won't you go? I've already done enough to hurt him. You shouldn't be here!"

Then came the words that shattered everything. "I was the one who had that accident arranged. I couldn't stand the thought of you marrying him!"

My throat closed up, and I couldn't make a sound. I braced myself against the wall, my fingers digging into the crack beside the door.

Ryan's hoarse voice came in broken fragments. "I know I've wronged him, but I can't control myself! I care about him. But I love you more. When I thought about you two getting married, having children… I… I had no choice. I had to do something!"

Nora lowered her eyes and merely looked at him.

Silence filled the room. I held my breath, waiting for her to demand justice for me. Those were the very words she'd once promised me herself, back when she was clutching my surgical consent forms.

But a few seconds later, I watched her raise her hand and gently wipe the tears from the corner of Ryan's eye.

"Don't be upset. What's done is done. It's not your fault."

I froze at her words.

That day, when Nora received the call about my accident, she'd abandoned a multibillion-dollar deal and stayed outside my operating room until the middle of the night. Over and over, she'd whispered my name under her breath, her face pale with worry.

Her concern that night had seemed so genuine then. Now she was comforting the man who had caused the accident, telling him none of it was his fault.

"Do you even hear yourself? I'm the one who had Nathan run down. And the miscarriage you had last time, when you fell… that was because of me, too…"

He never finished as Nora had suddenly thrown her arms around him, holding him tightly.

"It's not your fault. It's mine. I should have told you how I felt sooner. It's just a shame the baby came at the wrong time."

They clung to each other as if they wanted to disappear into one another.

I stood frozen against the wall outside the room, unable to move. The blood in my veins slowly turned cold, and I could barely breathe.

I'd always thought that, at the very least, she'd wanted that baby.

The day we found out she was pregnant, she'd held the test results in her hands, her face glowing with happiness. She'd even insisted on treating everyone at the hospital to afternoon tea. That same day, the moment we got home, she'd eagerly called the renovation company and told them to upgrade the nursery.

After the miscarriage, when she came out of the operating room, her eyes were red and swollen. She barely said a word to me. Instead, she turned and called her mother, her voice trembling as she demanded justice for our baby.

But now, because of Ryan, she was saying the baby had simply come at the wrong time, as if our child had been nothing more than an inconvenience.

My hand hovered over the doorknob for a long time. Then, slowly, it fell back to my side.

The last shred of hope I'd held onto for the two of them crumbled like a leaf falling apart beneath the weight of early autumn.

When I walked out of the hospital, Ryan's message came through at exactly the right moment. "Nathan, you saw us, didn't you? She loves me more than she loves you."

I didn't reply. I went straight home, grabbed the hammer from the toolbox, and smashed the nine-foot-wide wedding portrait hanging in the living room to pieces.