Chapter 1

The world spun around me for a moment. I calculated the angle perfectly and let myself flop gently toward Kyle Hargrove.

"Oops…"

I let out a quiet exclamation as my entire body landed squarely in his arms, my forehead pressing right against the hollow of his neck.

A sharp, pleasant scent instantly enveloped me—not the sterile disinfectant of the hospital, but more like expensive cedarwood.

I sneered inwardly, but outwardly, I acted utterly frail and weak.

My hands appeared completely devoid of strength as they clung to his shoulders. But secretly, I was bracing myself, twisting and turning, making sure I couldn't stand up on my own.

While I was squirming like this, I suddenly heard a low, heavy grunt from above me.

I froze.

Wait, that wasn't right. Wasn't he… disabled?

For someone in a wheelchair, certain bodily reactions should technically be much slower, but this response…

Just as my face heated, a scorching, large hand suddenly clamped down on my waist. The grip was shockingly strong—nothing like someone who'd been sick and weak for a long time.

I looked up in shock, and my eyes collided with a pair of deep, intense ones. There was no trace of the gentle concern he'd feigned earlier, only a dark, surging current beneath the surface.

On the surface, he wore the look of a man devastated by the news of having been dumped, but inside, he was scoffing.

"This playing-hard-to-get act is really pathetic. But… Talia's got quite a nice waist," he thought.

Before I could fully process his two-faced behavior, Kyle's lips were already pressing down against mine.

A night of pure abandonment followed.

When I regained consciousness, my entire body ached like it had been run over by a truck.

Sunlight filtered through the curtains. I jolted upright, realizing the space beside me was already empty.

The mess on the couch silently testified to the recklessness of the night before.

The culprit himself was now sitting impeccably dressed in his wheelchair, right beside the bed, looking at me with a complicated expression.

He had reverted to that fragile, helpless persona again, as if the aggressive, dominant man from last night had only been a hallucination.

"I'm sorry," he said first, his voice hoarse and thick with guilt. "When I heard that Mable wanted to break up with me, I couldn't accept it in that moment, and I lost control of my emotions. That's why I…"

He paused before continuing with difficulty, "I did something so unforgivable to you. It's all my fault. You can hit me or yell at me—I deserve it."

On his face was the picture of sincere remorse, but inside, he was thinking, "How troublesome. It was just one night, so why is she looking like she's about to burst into tears? Although… she wasn't half bad."

A surge of anger rose in me. As expected, they were all cut from the same cloth! My younger sister, Mable Munroe, faked her illness to scam money, and her boyfriend, Kyle, faked being poor and disabled to test true love.

No wonder they started dating each other!

But outwardly, I quickly suppressed every trace of emotion.

I pulled the blanket up to cover myself. My eyes reddened instantly, my voice trembling with sobs and disbelief.

"You… We… How can we ever face Mable again?"

When Kyle noticed the tears in my eyes—the tears I'd forced out—he froze for a moment, and a look of shame crossed his face.