Chapter 6 #2
“You have no right to—” He stopped himself, his lip shaking.
“You know nothing! I did my fair share for the company. Do you know the kind of impossible standards your grandfather had? Everything I did was wrong! To them, I was useless. A nobody. Always reminding me I didn’t have a degree, didn’t speak perfect English, didn’t grow up in the city, didn’t have some fancy family name.
” His fists quivered at his sides. “You know what that does to a man’s pride? It makes me feel small.”
“You shouldn’t have let it,” I shot back. “They were just words. Harsh ones, sure, but if you really loved her, that wouldn’t have mattered.”
“A princess…” His face softened, breaking for the first time. “She was like a princess out of a fairy tale. So beautiful, so elegant. Even famous actresses looked plain beside her. Every man wanted her, but no one dared to even approach.”
If I hadn’t been a victim of his temper, I might have thought he was talking about the love of his life.
“Are you serious right now?”
“Do you even know how we met?”
“No. And why are you telling me all this?” I stared him down, refusing to believe there was another version of the story. He was a gold digger—end of story. Nothing he said could change that.
“I had just arrived in Shanghai,” he said, his eyes distant. “Ran away from my village with my last few yuan for a train ticket. Everyone said Shanghai was magical—but not for the poor like me.” A faint smile crossed his lips.
I dug my nails into my palms. “Where are you going with this?”
“I slept in an ATM booth at night. Looked for jobs during the day. No one would hire me. Then I prayed. Over and over. And one night… she walked in. It was raining. She was soaked, waiting for her driver. I offered her my umbrella. My coat. I hadn’t showered for days, and people usually avoided me.
But not her.” His voice softened, almost reverent.
“She smiled—so bright I cried. She handed me a tissue and talked to me like I was human. The next day, I went to the company, half-thinking I’d imagined it.
But she’d kept her word. A job was waiting for me. ”
I barely remembered that version of Mom. The nice one. The one who wasn’t anxious or angry. There were brief moments—neutral, I guess—but never truly happy ones. Even her laughter had an edge that made me more worried than comforted.
“So you decided to ruin her life instead?” I scoffed.
He kept talking, lost in his story. “I started as a mail clerk, barely earning enough to eat. But I was grateful. Every day, I found excuses to go to her floor. Just to see her. Then, six months later…” He paused. “I saw her crying in the corner of the utility cabinet.”
“What kind of person acts like this?” The words tore out of me before I could stop them. My brain refused to accept that there had ever been anything romantic between them.
“Excuse me?” His brows shot up, like he was genuinely offended.
“You stalked Mom for months.” I shook my head, the disgust thick in my throat. “This isn’t some tragic love story. This is horror. Only a monster would do that.”
“You don’t know shit, kid.” His words insulted me in a way I couldn’t explain. “I saw an opportunity, and I took it. All those men who wanted her—they were just rich assholes. She needed me as much as I needed her. I gave her what she wanted. Comfort. Love. Attention.”
“This is fucked up.” My heart hammered. “You just admitted you’re a bag of crap. You used her to climb the ladder. You got promoted. You got the money.”
“Shut up.” His tone was sharp now, trembling with rage.
“And then you got out,” I went on, the anger pushing words through me like fire. “You got out, and now you want more. You want more for your mistress—and your bastard son.”
Pfft.
His saliva hit my face.
Cold.
Wet.
Disgusting.
It rolled down my cheek, mixing with the heat of my skin.
It felt like being doused in ice water in the middle of a storm.
There’s nothing more insulting than spit from your own father.
Something inside me snapped.
“Don’t you dare—” I lunged before he could finish.
The seatbelt locked. The impact jerked me forward, then back, but I didn’t stop. My hand found his throat. I didn’t even remember unbuckling. Maybe I hadn’t. Maybe I’d just broken free.
He made a strangled sound—half cough, half plea.
And I kept pressing.
His stare grew in disbelief, red threading through the whites. I could see the reflection of my own face in them—wild, unrecognizable.
He didn’t fight back. Just made these weak, helpless wheezing sounds—maybe a cough, maybe words that didn’t make sense anymore.
And God help me, it felt good.
Empowering.
But also terrifying. Because for the first time, I realized how easy it was to cross the line. How easy it was to lose myself.
His pulse thudded against my palms, and for a split second, I wasn’t sure if I’d ever let go.
“You want out?” I asked, my voice shaking, my hands tightening. “Fine. I’ll give you an out.”
He tried to say something—maybe my name—but it came out as a gasp.
Then came the screech.
Tires burned against asphalt. Metal screamed.
My world tilted.
A flash of light. A crushing sound.
Something slammed against my body.
And then—
Blackness.