Chapter 2A Lifetime of Atonement for Her

I woke from a sea of pain. Damian was there, dabbing my forehead with a warm cloth, his eyes filled with a convincing, heartbreaking sorrow.

“Does it hurt? I’m so sorry, my love. You fainted during your check-up. The doctors ran a full scan… your hands, they’ve gotten worse. And they found… they said there was a risk of cancer in your uterus, that it had to be removed. I tried to stop them, Christine, I really did.”

He stroked my hair. “Even if you can never have children, even if you’re blind and can’t use your hands for the rest of your life, you are still the only woman I love. My only wife.”

My hands were wrapped in even thicker bandages, and a searing pain radiated from my abdomen. I shifted slightly, and fresh blood immediately began to seep through the sterile gauze.

I said nothing. I only tried to get out of bed, a simple movement that sent Damian into a panic. He threw his arms around me, his voice cracking with apologies, hot tears splashing onto my bandaged hands, making the raw wounds sting even more.

He was practically on his knees. “Christine, it’s my fault, I’m so sorry! Please, don’t move. I’m begging you!”

Even now, when he thought I couldn’t see, he put on such a masterful performance. So good that I had believed it for years. I had believed he loved me to death.

A knot of ice formed in my chest, but I clung to one last, desperate thread of hope. “I’m fine. I was just dreaming of Mom and our little one. They said they were in so much pain. I miss them.”

Damian visibly relaxed. “Christine, it’s over. Don’t dwell on it. The man who did it was executed. Your mother can rest in peace. I’ll protect you now. You’re my everything. You miss the baby? I can have them bring Leo in, okay?”

I turned my head away, unwilling to expose his lie just yet. “No. Let him rest.”

My baby would never come back. And the last thing I wanted was to see Savannah’s child parading in front of me. All those times I’d held him, cuddled him… were he and his father laughing at me? Laughing at the pathetic, foolish woman holding her child’s replacement, a child of her enemy, and whispering loving words?

Damian didn’t sense the shift. He just chuckled playfully. “You spoil Leo so much. You don’t love him more than me, do you? I might get jealous. You need to love your son a little less, and your husband a little more.”

You switched my child like a thief in the night, Damian. You hoped I would pour all the love for my dead son onto yours.

I loved you for five years, and you couldn’t spare me a single truth.

I was the greedy one, after all.