Late at night, on the cross-sea bridge in Bayshore, there were barely any cars.

Iris Ashford gripped the steering wheel and rubbed her throbbing temple.

At Lux Group’s business cocktail party tonight, Sebastian Lux had left early because something came up. As his all-purpose secretary, she had taken a ton of drinks for him and even managed to lock down a nightmare client.

She was exhausted, no doubt about it, but deep down, she felt weirdly satisfied.

She glanced at the hangover soup sitting ready on the passenger seat and wondered if Sebastian would praise her, even just a little, when he saw it at home.

Three years of marriage, and it felt like she had always been doing things like this, quietly waiting for the tiny scraps of warmth he might show once in a blue moon. Or maybe never.

She was the daughter of the richest family, for crying out loud. But because she loved Sebastian Lux, she did all of it willingly, no complaints.

Just as her thoughts drifted, a sharp horn ripped through the night.

A massive truck, like some crazed beast gone off the rails, suddenly smashed through the center divider and charged straight into her lane.

Iris’s pupils shrank hard. Her mind blanked in an instant.

Survival instinct kicked in. She yanked the wheel hard to the right.

Bang—

The violent crash came with the awful screech of twisting metal as her car slammed into the bridge guardrail. The airbag exploded open, and the brutal impact pinned her hard against the seat.

Something warm and sticky slid down from her forehead. Blood ran along her cheek and dripped onto the back of her hand.

The whole world spun. Her ears buzzed so badly everything sounded underwater. The truck driver’s shout outside, the screams from passersby, all of it felt far away, blurry, unreal.

She tried to move, but her body felt like it had been filled with lead. The door had caved in so badly she was trapped inside the cramped wreck.

"Sebastian Lux..."

She forced the name out through clenched teeth, squeezing out every last bit of strength she had.

Before her consciousness completely faded, only one thought remained—

She had to go home. Sebastian was still waiting for her.

...

In the hospital, the smell of disinfectant seeped into everything, stabbing at Iris’s nerves.

Some kind passerby had pulled her out of the mangled car and brought her to the nearest hospital.

"Mild concussion. Her forehead needs stitches. Multiple soft tissue injuries. She’ll need to stay for observation."

The doctor’s cold, flat voice rang in her ears.

Iris lay on the hospital bed, her forehead already bandaged, but wave after wave of dizziness still made her want to throw up.

After the nurse finished treating her wounds, she asked gently, "Miss, what’s your family’s contact information? We need someone to come handle the admission paperwork."

"I... I’ll do it myself," Iris answered instinctively, then quickly changed it. "I’ll call my husband. He’ll be here right away."

The moment she said the word "husband," a trace of bitterness and hope rose in her chest, so faint she didn’t even fully notice it herself.

She pulled her phone out of her pocket. The screen was cracked, but it still worked. She found the pinned number at the top, her fingertips trembling slightly from nerves.

The phone rang for a long time before someone finally picked up.

"Hello."

Sebastian’s low, cold voice came through the receiver, just like always, flat and emotionless.

Iris’s nose stung. The fear and grievance she had been holding back for so long nearly rushed straight up her throat. She parted her lips, wanting to tell him she had been in a car accident, wanting to tell him she was scared out of her mind, wanting to hear him say, "Don’t be afraid. I’m coming now."

But before she could get out a single word, a soft female voice came from the other end. Delicate, a little aggrieved, quiet as it was, yet it hit Iris’s ear like a needle, dead center.

"Sebastian, my stomach feels a little off... can you stay with me?"

It was Clarissa Harrington.

In that instant, Iris’s heart dropped straight to the bottom.

She held the phone, and it felt like all the blood in her body had frozen.

There was a pause on Sebastian’s end, as if he was comforting the person beside him. Then he finally spoke into the phone, his tone impatient to the extreme.

"I’ve got something urgent. We’ll talk when I get back."

Beep... beep... beep...

The call ended cleanly, no hesitation, no pause.

Iris kept holding the phone in the same position, unmoving for a long time. The busy tone in the receiver sounded like it was mocking her, laughing at how ridiculous her tiny moment of hope had been.

Something urgent...

So Clarissa Harrington having a stomachache counted as urgent.

Then what about her? His wife, who had just crawled back from death’s doorstep—what was she supposed to count as?

Seeing how pale she looked, the nurse beside her asked with concern, "Miss, are you okay? When is your husband coming?"

Iris slowly lowered her hand and forced out a smile uglier than crying.

"He... he has something urgent to deal with. He probably can’t come."

That night, she handled the hospital admission all by herself, took every test alone, and bit down hard on her lip through the pain while her wound was stitched up.

Every time the nurse came in to change her dressing, she would ask, "Your family still hasn’t come?"

At first, Iris would say, "He’ll be here soon."

Later, she stopped answering at all.

She lay in the empty hospital room, waiting from deep night until dawn. Outside the window, the sky went from pitch-black to a pale fish-belly white.

The husband who had supposedly been "coming right away" never showed up.

The next morning, Iris’s concussion had eased a little. Supporting herself against the wall, she stepped out, wanting to get some air in the hallway.

She had barely taken a few steps out of the room when she saw a figure she knew all too well.

Sebastian Lux.

He was wearing that perfectly tailored black suit, tall and straight as ever. There was a trace of fatigue on his handsome face, but even more obvious was the tension and concern written all over it.

And in his arms, held with extreme care, was a woman.

That woman was Clarissa Harrington.

Sebastian lowered his head and, in a voice so gentle Iris had never once heard him use on her, asked softly,

"Still feeling uncomfortable anywhere? Want me to call the doctor again?"

Clarissa leaned weakly against his solid chest, one hand lightly resting on her lower abdomen, a content, happy smile on her face.

"I’m fine now. Just a little tired. Good thing you stayed with me."

"Silly girl. If I’m not with you, who else would I be with?"

Holding her in his arms, Sebastian walked slowly over from the obstetrics and gynecology department. Every step he took was steady, careful, like he was afraid even the slightest jolt might upset the woman he carried.

From beginning to end, his gaze stayed locked on Clarissa’s face. The tenderness and worry overflowing in his eyes were the kind of luxury Iris had dreamed of for three years of marriage, yet never once received.

Iris stood there at the corner of the hallway like some invisible person the whole world had forgotten.

A cold draft slipped in through the crack in the window, chilling her to the bone.

She lowered her head and looked at the hand wrapped in thick bandages from wrenching the steering wheel so hard. There were still dried bloodstains on the back of it.

So it wasn’t that he was naturally cold, that he didn’t know how to care for someone.

He just wasn’t willing to spare even the tiniest piece of that care for her.

His so-called "urgent matter" last night had been staying with another woman in the same hospital all night long.

All of a sudden, Iris felt like the biggest joke in the world.

She slowly turned around and walked back to that equally cold hospital room, one step at a time. Every step felt like she was treading on the shattered pieces of her own heart.