Chapter 2 - The Truth of My Dream

Alexandra Rossi.

I don’t know what happened after our passionate encounter this morning.

But it feels like déjà vu.

I woke up after sunset, the room silent and tidy.

I blinked.

I tried to remember everything that had happened with Tristan this morning.

His touch, his kisses, even his suppressed growls during our lovemaking were still vividly etched in my mind.

But now, there was no trace of our passion left.

Just me.

Me, naked and shivering, with bruises on several parts of my body.

“What is this…?”

I stood frozen in front of the mirror.

I let my body remain exposed as I counted and examined the bruises, realizing that their locations matched where Tristan had kissed me and left his marks of love this morning.

“Why?” I whispered, touching each bruise one by one.

The night breeze blowing through the balcony door’s crack touched my skin, sending chills down my spine.

I pulled the thick blanket over my naked body to warm myself as quickly as possible, then stepped out to the balcony to close the half-open door.

But my movement halted when I saw Tristan’s car lights flash at the gate.

“Tristan?”

I looked at the clock, which read 2 a.m.

It was identical to what I’d experienced days before.

The sound of Tristan laughing with a woman exiting the car and their shadows walking together toward the wine cellar behind our house was the same.

My heart started racing.

I froze momentarily before my logic took over, telling me to hurry outside in my thin nightgown, which nearly revealed my body’s outline.

I couldn’t remember what to bring, so I ran as fast as I could through our house’s dark hallways and rooms toward the backyard.

“Please don’t…! Don’t!”

I kept whimpering inwardly, hoping this would all revert to a dream.

Even when my foot tripped over a rock while running, it confirmed I was in reality.

The old wine cellar.

The same scent of women’s perfume.

Even the strong aroma of Tristan’s favorite wine filled the air.

Everything matched my prior experience exactly.

I froze again, staring straight ahead at the low, slightly open gate before me. From here, I could already distinguish Tristan’s figure with another woman.

Isabella Thortorn.

That woman was hugging Tristan tightly, exchanging saliva with my husband.

They might not have been having sex immediately. But their intimacy still wounded me and made my heart race as I watched every sensual movement from their embrace.

The sound of her moans and their lips pressing, grinding, and devouring each other made my ears ring and my consciousness nearly falter again.

My hands felt stiff as my body froze and rooted itself to the ground.

My breath caught; tears streamed down my face, yet my mouth felt sealed shut with tremendous force.

Only their voices were audible again.

But unlike yesterday, their conversation confirmed the reality I’d been facing.

“So she took the pill you gave her?” Isabella asked.

Her head rested on Tristan’s arm as he lit his cigar and chuckled after their deep kiss.

“Yeah, she’s writhing!” Tristan replied.

“Twitching?”

Like Isabella, I too was curious about Tristan’s meaning.

“The LSD powder I gave her made Alexa hallucinate, darling!” Tristan said, jolting me back to reality.

“L…S…D”

My throat burned and felt dry, realizing the dangerous substance that had entered my body last night.

“You didn’t know?” Tristan asked.

He then pulled out a bottle of medication wrapped in vitamin packaging—the pills I’d taken daily—and showed it to Isabella.

“All this time, Alexa has been taking this. With it, she always believed I’d touched her, loved her, and enjoyed her body… while in reality—”

Tristan leaned close to Isabella and gently kissed her lips.

“Only you are the one I kiss and love every night, Bella!”

My head felt struck by lightning hearing Tristan’s confession again.

“S-So all this time… I—”

My head suddenly dropped as I looked at my body—still unchanged from three years ago, before meeting Tristan.

He had never touched me.

He never truly made me his wife.

Tristan… the man I loved, the man I thought slept beside me and held me tightly, was never truly there.

My entire body shivered; I stood frozen.

Even as their laughter echoed, I remained motionless and silent behind the door. “So you gave her the drug that made her hallucinate?” Bella asked. “But what if she realizes?”

“She couldn’t possibly know, dear!” Tristan replied. “She even drank it all day like an idiot, then trembled from just a blanket’s touch?”

Tristan’s laughter erupted again, cutting deep into my heart.

I’ve never felt this filthy in my life.

I imagined myself growling and moaning alone, touching every part of my body with my own hands.

I was shattered.

My heart tore and ached as if pierced by thousands of knives at once.

I briefly considered bursting in and losing control, but I chose to retreat and hide behind the door to uncover more secrets.

And my decision was right.

Because afterward, their conversation became knives that kept piercing me mercilessly.

“If you don’t want to touch her, why did you marry her, Tristan?”

That was the question I’d wanted to ask him.

Tristan burst into laughter again, the sound of his burning cigar audible.

“She’s an amazing sommelier, Bella!” Tristan replied. “I needed her to develop the best wine for the Laurent Group!”

“If that’s why, you could just pay her, Tristan! You didn’t need to make her your wife!” Isabella complained.

Though I couldn’t see Isabella’s expression, I imagined her frustration through her tone.

“Do you know how much I’d pay for a sommelier like Alexa, dear?” Tristan countered.

He walked toward the door and tossed the cigar stub before speaking again.

“By marrying Alexa, I get everything—her sommelier skills and the wine sales strategies that brought Laurent this far!” Tristan said proudly.

“And it’s free, dear! I just provide housing and meals, without introducing her to colleagues!”

My chest tightened hearing this.

No wonder Tristan always refused to take me to meetings.

He always claimed we needed professionalism so competitors wouldn’t learn I was Laurent Group’s skilled sommelier.

Slowly, every oddity in our marriage found its answer.

Until it was no longer sadness or weakness.

Tonight, my tears and pain slowly turned into fierce hatred and anger toward Tristan and the entire Laurent Group.

My hands clenched tightly; my teeth ground together.

“I’ll start the game too, Tristan!” I growled at him.