Never Too Late to Return

Cassian’s body stiffened at once. He blurted out, almost too quickly:

“Did you… did you have a nightmare?”

Then, frantic, he added,

“Dreams aren’t real—don’t believe them!”

The clumsy cover only made his guilt more obvious.

I didn’t bother to probe. My eyes stayed fixed on the teddy bear being carried out.

“A rotten bear,” I said evenly. “It should’ve been thrown away long ago.”

Just like our love.

Perhaps he sensed the change in me. Though the doctor ordered me to rest, Cassian refused to leave my side—except at night.

Always at night.

I woke every time he slipped away. Sometimes, they even returned together, entering our bedroom with whispers and stifled laughter.

Sorrel’s voice was unmistakable, breaking through the darkness in the heat of their entanglement.

“Cassian… when will you restore Elowen’s memory? You’ve wasted ten years of marriage on revenge. I’ve waited for you for ten years. Isn’t it enough?”

And Cassian, lost in his own delusion, always answered the same way:

“Soon. It’s almost time.”

He never noticed the venom in Sorrel’s eyes when she looked at me.

She began stealing my pills. What she didn’t know was that Cassian, afraid I might discover their affair, dosed my food with even more.

Piece by piece, my memory unraveled. Whole days passed with me sitting blankly at the window, staring at nothing.

Cassian was satisfied. He thought my silence meant I no longer clung to him. He even looked relieved, as though he’d grown tired of the doll he had spent years molding.

It was laughable. He had forced me into a world that revolved only around him—yet now even he found it suffocating.

I said nothing. I simply let myself forget him, little by little.

Until that dinner.

The villa doors burst open with a bang. Sorrel stumbled in, hair disheveled, and dropped to her knees before me.

“My mother has a heart condition! If you want revenge, come at me—don’t touch my family!” she screamed, her tears shrill and practiced.

Outside, camera flashes exploded like fireworks. Reporters swarmed, shouting over one another:

“Mr. Durel, how do you respond to your wife’s revelation about your affair with Ms. Sorrel?”

“Was your ten-year love story nothing but a lie?”

For ten years, Cassian’s devotion had been the fairy tale of our circle. Now, with the story torn apart by another woman, the outrage naturally fell on Sorrel.

Microphones shoved into her face, the questions merciless.

Cassian’s expression darkened. His stormy gaze found me—sharp, accusing. But in the end, he said nothing to me.

Instead, he pulled Sorrel close, shielding her with his body. “I’ll handle this,” he murmured, before ordering his secretary to arrange an immediate transfer abroad for Sorrel and her family.

Sorrel’s eyes flickered with something sharp. She pressed a few times on her phone.

Less than a minute later, Cassian’s phone rang. The news hit like a hammer: Sorrel’s parents had been killed in a sudden car accident.

She collapsed at my feet, clutching my trouser leg.

“I was wrong, I was really wrong!” she wailed, incoherent, yet every word twisted the knife into me.

“You warned me in high school not to take what was yours… I was expelled then, but I never learned… Now look—I’ve killed my parents, ruined my whole family—because of you!”

Cassian’s eyes burned red. His grip clamped around my wrist, crushing bone.

“Why are you so cruel!”

And beside him, Sorrel sobbed, knocking her head against the floor.

“I beg you… let my family go. I don’t want anything anymore…”