His s*x Tape Exposed, I Leave Him

Chapter 7

When Rose opened her eyes again, the sharp tang of disinfectant flooded her nose. She lay still in a stark white hospital room.

A nurse walked in carrying a medicine tray. When she saw Rose forcing herself up in her arms to sit up, she hurried over to steady her, her voice thick with sympathy.

"The cuts on your back are really deep, they're all those tiny, dense glass scrapes all over. Don't you dare move around too much. When you go home, you have to have a family member change your dressing on time, okay? If you don't, you'll end up with ugly scars, and the wounds can get infected over and over again."

Rose froze mid-movement. Every tiny shift wrenched a sharp agony through the flesh of her back, and the bone-deep pain spread to every corner of her body.

She tugged the faintest curve at the corner of her mouth, her voice so light it was barely a breath of wind. "I don't have any family left."

Twelve years ago, her parents died in a sudden accident. Their big, whole home shattered into pieces in an instant.

That year, she knelt on the cold stone in front of their tombstones, sobbing until her heart ached so bad she thought it would split in two, until she nearly blacked out.

Back then, the one who'd stood right beside her and cried with her was Kaye. The one who'd stood silently behind her, holding an umbrella to block the wind and rain for her was Chris.

Once upon a time, Rose truly believed these two people would be her only family and her salvation for the rest of her life.

But now? One had betrayed her whole heart, the other had ruined her entire future. Both of them had thrown her straight down into the abyss.

The ward door clicked open from outside, hurried footsteps tapping rapidly across the tile.

Chris strode straight to her bed, leaned down, and pulled her straight into a tight, crushing hug.

His voice held an edge of anger and reprimanded, "Those two useless bodyguards! I explicitly told them not to let you step a single foot outside the house. Rose, you've been such a bad girl."

He held her so tight his grip was brutal, laced with the controlling, self-righteous gentleness he thought was love.

He held her for a long moment before finally letting go, then started explaining on his own, unprompted, "Kaye's gotten dizzy at the sight of blood since she was little, you know that. You've always told me she's your best friend, the closest person we have. When she got hurt and started bleeding, she panicked so badly it was an emergency. I had no choice but to get her to the hospital first. Rose, are you hurt?"

Rose's heart was completely dead inside. No grief, no anger, just complete, empty numbness.

She lifted a hand and gently pushed his embrace away. "I'm fine. Go take care of her."

It was only then that Chris finally saw the gauze wrapped thick around her back, dark blood seeping faintly through the fabric, a gut-wrenching, horrifying sight.

His pupils blew wide with shock, his voice dropped instantly, laced with disbelieving panic. "How did you get hurt this badly? Why didn't you say anything to me back then?"

Rose lifted her eyes to meet his. There wasn't a single ripple in her gaze, blank and frighteningly calm. "You were busy taking care of the injured person. I understand."

Before all this, she'd been the jealous type. Even the tiniest bit of coldness from him would leave her moping for hours, and she'd cling to him, pouting and begging for comfort.

But now? She was unnervingly calm, so detached she might as well have been a stranger watching from the sidelines.

A strange, cold panic welled up in Chris' chest. For the first time ever, his unshakable certainty that he controlled everything crumbled completely.

"Rose," he frowned hard, his voice tight with unease, "you never used to be like this."

Rose pulled a bitter, thin, cold little smile. "You never used to be like this either."

That one line knocked the wind clean out of him, leaving him completely speechless.

Dead silence dropped over the hospital room, so thick you could cut it with a knife, so quiet they could hear each other's ragged breathing hanging in the air.

After a long, heavy moment, Chris let out a tired sigh and reined in the sharp anger coiled around him. "Get some rest. I'll come back to check on you later."

He leaned down and brushed a stray strand of hair away from her forehead, his voice was cloyingly soft, so obviously fake. "No matter what happens, you're always the one I love."

When he reached the door of the ward, he paused mid-step, then looked back and said coolly, "We need to change the maid of honor for the wedding. Kaye hurt her arm and needs rest, so she can't make it."

Not long after Chris left, Rose's phone buzzed. It was a text message from Kaye.

Kaye: You won. He found out I was the one who set off the explosion at the café. He screamed at me, insisted on sending me abroad, and said I'm never allowed to come back.

Kaye: I won't show my face around you two ever again. Have a good life together.

Rose stared at the words glowing on the screen, her gaze didn't flicker even once.

Won?

She had never won once.

In this twisted, tangled love triangle between the three of them, she had been the only loser from the very start.

She couldn't even be bothered to reply, she slowly closed her eyes and let exhaustion and cold seep into every inch of her body.

On the day she was discharged, Chris came personally to pick her up. He fussed over every little detail the entire ride home, as gentle and thoughtful as if every single hurt and betrayal that had happened before never existed at all.

The day before the wedding, he took her to the hotel under the pretense of running through the ceremony rehearsal.

Rose knew full well what he was like, stubborn, controlling to the bone. If she refused to play along, it would only lead to harsher restrictions and even more forceful pressure.

Back in the hotel banquet hall, everything for the rehearsal was already set up perfectly.

And there, standing calmly at the end of the red carpet in a crisp made-of-honor gown, was Kaye. The same Kaye who was supposed to have been sent halfway across the world.

The second their eyes locked, Chris' fingers tightened around Rose's hand so hard her bones ached.

Kaye's face was paper-white, her eyes crisscrossed with bloodshot red veins. She forced a wobbly smile onto her lips and said, "Rose, I'm your best friend. On your wedding day, I had to be here personally to send you off."

The wedding emcee stepped forward, calm and organized, and started arranging everyone for the red-carpet rehearsal.

Once they finished walking through the entire process, Chris leaned in and pressed a soft kiss to Rose's cheek.

His voice dropped to a low, love-drunk murmur. "Rose, I can't wait any longer to make you my bride."

Standing behind them, Kaye didn't utter a single word. Her face was as pale as bleached paper, and every line of her body screamed defeat and heartache.

The second that gentle kiss landed, the last fragile thread holding her together snapped clean in two.

She flung her hand up and smashed her phone against the hard floor. The sharp, brittle shatter cut through the quiet of the banquet hall, and every eye in the room snapped to her in an instant.

"Sorry." Kaye's eyes glistened red, and she fought to hold back the tears burning at her lids.

Her voice came out rough and shaky, "I'm not feeling well, I'm just going to the bathroom." She spun on her heel and ran, stumbling away in a panicky, disheveled retreat.

All through the rehearsal, Chris' mind had been elsewhere. His phone buzzed nonstop in his pocket, notifications popping up one after another, and the constant interruption grated on his nerves until he was raw.

His brow furrowed deep with irritation as he spoke to Rose, "I need to take this work call. I'll be right back, just wait here for me."

Rose nodded quietly, watching his hurried retreating back, and only dead, empty desolation hollowed out her chest.

Only when his figure vanished completely from sight did she slowly lift her feet and head toward the bathroom.

The stall door shook violently. Muffled sobs and thick, choked weeping leaked through the cracks, mixed with the soft, messy sounds of two bodies tangled together.

"Chris, you're really going to drive me crazy…" Kaye's voice came thick with tears, heavy with wronged pain and blind obsession. "Watching the two of you get married is already driving me insane. Don't send me away, okay? We can just go back to how things used to be. I won't throw fits, I won't fight for anything, I won't mess up your life. I just beg you not to push me away for good."

No answer came back. All that could be heard were hungry, silent kisses and breathing that grew heavier and more ragged by the second.

Rose stood just outside the bathroom stalls, and her stomach rolled hard. Wave after wave of raw, physical nausea crashed over her.

She'd just turned to leave when a sharp, blood-curdling scream of agony burst from inside the stall.

"Ah! I'm bleeding!"