When Love Grew Cold

Chapter 2

Tears slipped silently down my face as I turned and walked out of the noisy bar.

In the cool night breeze, I couldn't help thinking back on the absurd tragedy of my two marriages.

My ex-husband, Julian Hart, and I had been considered a perfect match. Our families had been close for generations, and we were both devoted academics.

At 28, I earned my doctorate in physics without ever having been in a relationship. My parents were frantic and arranged one blind date after another.

Julian was 30 at the time and had just earned his doctorate in finance. His family was hounding him to marry just as relentlessly.

With both families eagerly pushing us together, we became a couple.

After we married, he joined a university as a finance professor, while I devoted myself to physics research at an institute.

But less than 1 year into our marriage, I saw Julian's twisted personality for what it was.

He had minored in psychology and excelled at emotional manipulation. Day after day, he subtly belittled and invalidated me. His relentless gaslighting made me question myself and eroded my confidence.

Worse still, he was skilled in hypnosis and constantly interfered with my mind without my noticing. Little by little, he tried to erase my sense of self and condition me into an obedient puppet who depended entirely on him.

I couldn't bear it. I asked for a divorce countless times.

But my parents threatened to kill themselves if I left him. Obsessed with appearances and our supposedly perfect family backgrounds, they forced me to give in.

Those were the darkest days of my life. Living felt worse than dying.

Trapped in a suffocating marriage, I suffered a mental breakdown. I developed severe depression and began hurting myself.

The worst time, I cut my wrist and nearly bled to death.

Miles saved me.

Back then, he was Julian's student. He came to our home to deliver some documents and found me barely alive.

From that day on, he refused to leave my side.

He had been so bright and passionate then, so sincere and unguarded. Like a small sun breaking through the darkness, he slowly brought light back into my decaying, colorless life.

Later, he was also the one who found evidence that Julian had been secretly drugging me for a long time.

My breakdown had never been caused by weakness. The drugs had been destroying me from the inside.

With the evidence Miles found, I sent Julian to prison and divorced him.

That year, Miles had just graduated from college, brimming with confidence and promise.

He didn't care I was his professor's ex-wife or that there was an 8-year age gap between us. He ignored every rumor and judgment and pursued me with reckless devotion.

He solemnly promised I would be the only woman he ever loved and that life without me would be unbearable.

But I couldn't bring myself to hold him back, and I was terrified of falling in love again.

To escape him, I moved to another city.

I never imagined Miles would be so stubbornly determined. To find me, he quit a promising job, severed ties with his parents, and came alone to the city where I lived.

It was the dead of winter, and snow filled the sky. Wearing only a thin coat, he waited outside my building the entire night.

By the next day, his fever had reached 104℉. His body was burning, yet he still refused to leave.

That was the moment my resolve finally broke.

Moved by his overwhelming sincerity, I set aside every fear and chose to be with him.

5 years passed in the blink of an eye.

Miles was only 27 now, yet he was already highly successful and known as a rising star in finance.

I was 35, absorbed in research and no longer young. We no longer looked like a match.

Paige was my student. At only 20, she was young, beautiful, and radiant with life.

As it happened, a research project I led had recently achieved a major milestone. My mentor sincerely invited me to join the National Center for Advanced Physics and participate in a secure, closed research program.

He told me that with me on the team, the National Strategic Physics Initiative would break through its bottlenecks much sooner and deliver a major scientific achievement in service of the nation.

But the program required total isolation. Once I joined, I would have to devote myself to it for at least 5 years without leaving my post.

I had hesitated and delayed my answer because Miles had always wanted a child.

I was 35. If I left for 5 years, I would be 40 when I returned, well past the ideal age to have a baby.

Now, every concern had vanished.

Someone else could give him the child he wanted so badly.

I texted my mentor without hesitation.

Nora: Professor Bennett, I'm willing to join the National Center and enter the closed research program.

He replied at once.

Professor Bennett: Good. I'll see you in 3 days.

Finally, my heart was calm.

Love had shattered, but I still had my career and the pursuit to which I had devoted my life.

When I returned home, I washed up and went straight to bed.

I had no idea how long I had been asleep when the front door opened softly. A light sleeper, I woke at once and stumbled groggily into the living room.

Miles walked in with Paige in his arms.