Half the Fortune, All My Freedom

Everyone in Riverton knew Serena Prescott, the heiress of the Prescott family, collected boyfriends for the short term and never kept them for long.

In five years of marriage, she had gone through ninety-nine new lovers.

People in our circle said I had world-class patience, that I was the perfect husband who could endure anything.

Then a swimming coach named Mason Clark appeared at Serena's side.

Mason came from an ordinary family, yet he made her break her own rule about never bringing new lovers home.

Serena gave me two choices.

Either calmly accept him moving in, or take the money and leave, ending our marriage.

Everyone was waiting to see me swallow my pride for love and keep playing the useless, obedient husband.

This time, I chose divorce.

Because in my last life, I chose to endure it, and all I got was Mason pushing further and further.

He forbade Serena from sharing a room with me and only allowed her to see me once a month.

In the end, the two of them had a son and a daughter and lived in endless glory.

I guarded a marriage that existed in name only, then died of illness in a nursing home.

Now that I've been given another life, I no longer have any attachment to her.

I took half the fortune in exchange for the freedom of the rest of my life.

The private room fell into a silence as dead as a morgue.

A crack finally appeared in Serena Prescott's calm expression. She asked again, "Caleb Warren, are you sure?"

I didn't answer. I signed my name at the end of the divorce agreement.

Then I pushed the agreement toward her.

"Yes. I'm sure.

"When will the money be transferred? I'll go home and pack in a while."

How could I not be sure?

In my last life, I'd been naive enough to think that as long as I was still her husband, no one could cross that line.

We'd had so many years together. I thought that as long as the misunderstanding from back then was cleared up, our relationship could still return to what it had once been.

What I waited for instead was Serena and Mason Clark growing old together with children and grandchildren, loving each other until the end.

Meanwhile, I guarded an empty marriage and became an invisible housekeeper in the Prescott family.

Everyone mocked me as a useless man who couldn't even control his own wife.

In my old age, when I went to the hospital to bring Serena food while she was sick, I overheard her bragging to Mason.

She said the scandal back then, the one about me spending the night with five women, had been arranged by her.

"Honestly, there was nothing wrong with him. He was just too boring. Who'd want to spend a lifetime with a dull block of wood like that?"

"You're really ruthless," Mason said.

She laughed softly, without the slightest guilt. "If I hadn't been ruthless, how would he have obediently listened to me and let me cheat?"

It hit me like a bolt of lightning.

No wonder every time I'd tried to explain, she'd coldly told me to shut up.

Because she'd known the truth all along.

She didn't love me anymore, but she used a lie as a shackle and trapped me for an entire lifetime.

She trampled my feelings underfoot, watched me suffer for her, and took pride in it.

Now, looking at her young face again, I felt no love at all.

Only a wave of nausea.

The whispers in the private room began again.

"Look at that. He's playing hard to get, isn't he?"

"I bet he won't last three days before he comes crying back to Serena."

"Exactly. Without the Prescott family, what is he?"

Someone deliberately turned toward Mason and exclaimed in an exaggerated tone, "Still, our Mason is young, handsome, and in great shape.

"Serena must be so lucky at night. Unlike certain older men who look like they can't even stand upright."

Mason, the person being praised, pressed his lips together and pretended to be shy.

"It's not just at night. Daytime too. I've got the stamina, after all."

He deliberately glanced at me and added with an innocent expression, "Oh, I didn't mean the old man can't perform. Please don't misunderstand."

The room burst into laughter.

Serena sat there without saying a word.

Just like countless times in the past, she didn't defend me.

I tugged at the corner of my mouth and stood.

Since we're already divorced, I no longer have any duty to entertain these clowns.

Over the years, I didn't just manage every messy detail of Serena's personal investment company.

I also handled all her trivial affairs and went with her to entertain these friends who only knew how to mock me.