C05
“I’m not coming home tonight. I won’t return until you apologize to Wendy.”
“Juliana, you brought this on yourself. I can’t believe I was foolish enough to marry you in the first place.”
Before I could respond, Jacob hung up.
When I tried calling him back, I realized–he had blocked me.
I sat on the couch in silence, staring into the empty night until the first light of dawn crept through the window.
It was time to leave.
This wasn’t my home.
There was no family here for me.
Just as I stepped outside, my phone rang. It was my lawyer.
“Ms. Juliana, I have an update on the case you asked me to investigate. We’ve found substantial evidence. The perpetrator has been identified.”
Three years.
Jacob had spent three years claiming he couldn’t find the culprit.
But my lawyer? He uncovered the truth in just three days!
Obviously, I had been too naive, too trusting.
If I hadn’t placed my faith in Jacob, my mother wouldn’t have died with injustice weighing on her soul.
The lawyer sent the files to my phone.
And just as I had suspected–my mother’s attacker was Wendy.
Even worse, when Jacob arrived at the scene, Wendy was still beating my mother.
Instead of stopping her, he erased the evidence and helped her escape.
He silenced every witness with hush money.
For three years, he had fed me lies.
This time, my lawyer went in person to uncover the truth.
A small shop owner nearby, unable to bear the weight of guilt any longer, handed over surveillance footage they
had kept for years.
My mother’s medical records were also in the file he sent.
The report clearly stated that her condition could have been treated. She could have recovered.
Tears blurred my vision as I whispered into the phone, “Send all of this to Jacob.”
I didn’t want to see him again.
C
Dragging my suitcase behind me, I left the home we had once shared and returned to my mother’s old house.
The irony stung.
Jacob had always claimed to love me, yet he had never once visited the place where I grew up.
9:32 AM
For His First Love, My Husband Killed My Mother
Yet here, everything remained just as it had when I was a child.
Curled up on the old couch, I felt a long–lost sense of safety.
The next morning, I went to the telecom store to cancel my phone number. I wanted to cut all ties with Jacob. As I waited, the store’s television played an interview with him.
Onscreen, Wendy clung to his arm, looking blissfully content.
The reporter smirked and asked, “Mr. Williams, there are rumors online that you and Ms. Wendy were once
lovers. That she is the one you truly love. Is that true?”
Jacob hesitated before answering, “When my father passed away, he wished for me to marry Juliana.”
A single sentence. But at that moment, the entire audience gasped.
Wendy, emboldened, tightened her grip on his arm, her face full of triumph.
I bit my lip, forcing back tears.
So, he had only proposed to me because of Uncle Jayce’s dying wish.
All this time, I had believed he loved me. I had thought his confession came from the heart. But from the very
beginning, I was just fooling myself.
Our families had been close for generations. But after my father died saving Uncle Jayce, my family fell from
grace.
Out of gratitude, Uncle Jayce had taken care of my mother and me.
I just never imagined that before he passed, he would force Jacob to marry me.
I finally understood–Uncle Jayce had wanted to compensate me. But his kindness had only made Jacob resent
- me. And in the end, it had cost my mother her life.
Just then, my phone buzzed with a message.
It was from Jacob.
“Juli, in love, the one who cares more is always the first to give in. So, I’m giving in. Let’s stop this, okay? Let’s
make up.”
“I’ve already apologized to Wendy on your behalf and comforted her. I’ll be coming home tonight. I want to eat
your handmade noodle soup.”
My tears finally fell, unstoppable.
Even now, he was still lying to me? Did he ever truly love me?
To him, “comforting” Wendy was just another way of declaring his love for her.
The store clerk glanced at me in surprise, hesitating before asking cautiously, “Ms. Juliana, do you still want to cancel your number?”
I nodded. “Yes. Cancel it. I don’t need it anymore.”
As I watched the scissors snip through my SIM card, I felt a strange sense of closure–like I had severed my last connection to the past.
