Send you tenderness

Abigail gasped at the sudden blow.

Yet Megan’s expression stayed eerily calm. Her eyes met Aaron’s in midair—both momentarily stunned—before they looked away in a weirdly synchronized move, as though they’d rehearsed it.

A sharp slap cut the silence. Aaron had just smacked Abigail’s rear right in front of her, but his challenging stare was fixed on Megan.

“Dreamy, go back first,” he said, using Abigail’s nickname.

Megan, bent over to turn on the camera, paused. Straightening, she met Abigail’s resentful, furious glare.

The door clicked shut. Now Megan was alone in the room with the half-dressed man on the bed.

Aaron tilted his chin up with a sneer. “Hah. Why are you still standing there? Strip. She’s gone. Now it’s your turn.”

Megan held his gaze for three seconds, then began removing her clothes with mechanical movements.

As she undid the second button of her blouse, Aaron snatched his clothes from the floor, lit a cigarette, and brushed past her. “Boring.”

He accused her of barging in like some numb machine, ruining his mood.

Aaron rummaged through his suit jacket on the sofa, pulled out his wallet, and shoved a card into her lace bra. “The girl from last time is getting complicated. You’ll have to handle it.”

Megan glanced down but didn’t move.

When she stayed silent, Aaron suddenly grabbed her chin, forcing her to look at him. “What? You were so determined to leave back then, but you came crawling the moment you needed money. Can’t you even do this?”

Megan said nothing.

After a long moment, she skipped the topic entirely. Her eyes calm, she asked, “Our contract only has one month left. You’ll give me the study abroad spot then, right?”

They’d agreed long ago: during the contract, Megan would be available whenever he called. In return, Aaron would pay her an astronomical sum and arrange a study abroad placement.

Megan’s hand clenched tightly in her pocket. She watched his expression darken, his gaze turn icy, veins bulging at his temples.

The card was yanked out violently and slapped against the side of her face—the sting immediate, searing.

“Get out.”

Megan said nothing. She picked the card up from the floor and left, utterly humiliated.

Only when she arrived at the private dining room Aaron had specified and saw the college girl did she understand what he’d meant by “complicated.”

She remembered her—the film student Aaron had fallen for at first sight a while back, then grown bored of after a few encounters.

The girl was pregnant. The moment she saw Megan, she seemed to know exactly why she was there, trembling as she hid behind her parents.

Aaron’s instruction had been clear: the child had to disappear.

When Megan coldly stated the purpose of her visit—to arrange an abortion—the girl’s father smashed a wine glass on the table. Enraged, he shoved her hard. Megan lost her balance and fell to the floor.

“Have you ever had a child?” he shouted. “Do you have any idea how much damage an abortion does to a girl? Let me tell you, we won’t let this go!”

With that, he kicked the pale-faced Megan on the ground—once, twice. Instinctively, she curled protectively around her abdomen, her mind flooding with images of her own daughter.

The man spat on her. “Disgusting! Persuading someone to abort! I hope if you ever have a child, the same thing happens to you!”

The family stormed out, leaving Megan curled on the floor. It took her a moment to struggle up.

Looking at Aaron’s cold, demanding message about terminating the pregnancy, all those painful memories came crashing back like a tidal wave.

Megan thought they were right.

She had been too weak. She hadn’t protected her daughter. If she’d fought harder back then, if she’d gotten her into an incubator in time… could she have saved her?

Would her daughter blame her?

And now, fate had given her another chance at motherhood—a child with Aaron, of all people. With only one ovary left, this might be her last chance.

She wanted so desperately to protect this child. But why did it have to be Aaron’s?

Once she felt steady enough, Megan went to the hospital alone for a check-up. Thankfully, everything was fine.

By the time she left, rumors about an illegitimate child in Aaron’s family were spreading like wildfire across the city.

Headlines flooded social media: “Heir’s Girlfriend Shows Her True Colors, Forces Abortion with ‘Official’ Authority.” Unblurred photos of Megan were plastered everywhere—on skyscrapers, at bus stops, in shop windows. Not a single image of Aaron appeared among them.

Megan endured the whispers and pointed stares all the way home.

But she didn’t know that returning home was where her real nightmare would begin.