All Chapters of The Rich Man's Proxy Marriage: Chapter 141 - Chapter 150

The hospital at dawn was a place without shadows.Light crept through frosted windows, sterile and unforgiving, illuminating everything people usually preferred to keep hidden—fear, exhaustion, truth.Elena woke before the machines did.Her body ached in places she didn’t remember injuring. Bruises bloomed beneath the thin hospital gown like memories that hadn’t decided whether they were real yet. Her throat felt dry. Her head felt heavy.But she was alive.She turned her head slightly.Holden was still there.He hadn’t moved all night.He sat in the chair beside her bed, elbows resting on his knees, fingers interlaced as if holding himself together by force alone. His jacket was draped over the back of the chair. His tie was gone. The sharp lines he usually carried like armor had softened into something human and fragile.He hadn’t slept.Elena knew that instinctively.She shifted, the sheets whispering softly.Holden’s head snapped up immediately.“You’re awake.”It wasn’t a questio

Elena recovered faster than anyone expected.That, paradoxically, was the problem.Her bruises faded into pale shadows. Her steps grew steadier. The tremor in her hands disappeared.But Holden did not loosen his grip.Not even slightly.“You don’t need to walk that far,” he said when she reached for her coat.“It’s the garden,” Elena replied. “Not a battlefield.”He didn’t smile.“I’ll walk with you.”“That’s not the point.”He was already signaling security.Elena stopped.“Holden.”He froze—not because of her tone, but because she had said his name like that. Quiet. Direct. Unignorable.“I’m not glass,” she said.“You were bleeding on concrete less than two weeks ago.”“And now I’m breathing,” she replied. “On my own.”He stepped closer, lowering his voice.“You don’t get to decide when you’re safe again.”She met his gaze.“And you don’t get to decide that I never will be.”Silence pressed between them.This was new territory.Not anger. Not defiance.Negotiation.Holden exhaled

Recovery, Elena learned, was not a straight line.Some mornings she woke up feeling almost whole—steady legs, clear thoughts, breath that did not catch when she stood too quickly. Other mornings, the world tilted the moment she opened her eyes, and the ceiling above her felt unfamiliar, as if she had woken up in someone else’s life.On those mornings, Holden was always there.Not sleeping.Watching.He sat in the armchair near the window, jacket folded beside him, phone face-down on the table. When she stirred, his head lifted instantly, eyes sharp as if he’d been awake for hours.“How do you feel?” he asked every time.Not good morning.Not did you sleep.Just that.“I’m fine,” Elena answered out of habit.Holden never accepted it.He crossed the room, checking her pulse, her temperature, the faint bruise on her wrist that had almost faded. He adjusted the pillows even when she hadn’t asked, opened the curtains a precise amount, poured water and set it within reach.She watched him q

Elena woke before dawn.Not because of pain—her body had finally begun to obey her again—but because of the quiet. The kind of silence that pressed too close, too aware.Holden was awake.She could feel it without opening her eyes.His presence had become that familiar: a weight in the room, steady and unyielding. When she finally turned her head, she found him sitting in the chair beside her bed, sleeves rolled up, phone dark in his hand, gaze fixed on her face as if she might disappear if he blinked.“How long have you been watching?” she asked softly.“All night.”She closed her eyes again.“That’s not normal.”“It’s necessary.”The same word.Always the same word.She pushed herself upright slowly. He moved instantly, hand hovering near her shoulder, ready to catch her if she swayed. She didn’t.“I can stand on my own,” she said.“I know.”“Then let me.”He hesitated—just half a second—but withdrew his hand.That hesitation told her everything.Breakfast was silent. Holden barely

Distance, Elena discovered, was not created by miles.It was created by rules.Within forty-eight hours of their argument, the rules appeared.They arrived quietly—like dust settling on furniture no one remembered moving.Her office access card no longer opened the executive elevator. Her calendar showed meetings she hadn’t approved and absences she hadn’t requested. People still greeted her with respect, but something fundamental had shifted.She was no longer inside.She was adjacent.Elena stood in the hallway outside the boardroom, staring at the frosted glass.Holden was inside.She could see his silhouette through the blur—still, authoritative, absolute.The door did not open for her.She didn’t knock.She turned away.That was the moment she understood: Holden hadn’t pushed her out in anger.He had done it calmly.Deliberately.As if he were amputating something he loved to save the rest of his body.At home, the atmosphere was worse.Holden was everywhere and nowhere at once.