Chapter 1
It was the fifth year since my divorce from Julian Cole.
We ran into each other in the emergency corridor of the hospital.
He was holding his adopted daughter, Chloe Foster, who was burning up with a fever. Sweat covered his forehead, his shirt was smeared with her vomit, and he looked like a complete mess.
Meanwhile, I was wearing a white coat as a specialist, my makeup perfectly done, about to pick up my fiancé from getting off work.
As he passed by, he grabbed my wrist, almost desperately.
His voice was hoarse, urgent, and somehow so familiar as he asked, "Vivian, do you still have those fever meds you always carry? Chloe's feeling really awful."
I stopped in my tracks and calmly brushed his hand off my wrist.
Then, I took out an alcohol wipe from my bag right in front of him, and slowly, almost deliberately, cleaned the spot where he'd touched me.
Once and twice.
After doing all this, I threw the wipe into the trash and pointed toward the registration desk at the end of the hall.
I replied, "Julian, this is a hospital. You need to go to the pharmacy to get the medicine.
"Besides, I don't have the habit of carrying meds with me anymore.
"Because the guy who always made me worry sick when he got ill, and would freeze me out over the smallest thing, isn't my husband now."
*****
Julian stood there, completely stunned.
His face, usually so aloof and commanding, was now flushed with both embarrassment and anger, a truly spectacular sight.
He probably never thought that I'd ever stand up to him.
Back then, I was the one who tiptoed around him, too scared to even raise my voice. But now, I was the one who tossed his pride onto the floor and stepped on it without a second thought.
After a brief silence, a piercing shout from the side shattered the awkwardness.
"Vivian! Don't pretend you're so above it all!"
Penelope Reed finally lost it at last.
She rushed over, pinching her nose, her heavily made-up face full of disgust and malice.
She sneered, "Aren't you just some creepy mortuary makeup artist? A walking bad omen.
"Those hands of yours belong in the morgue. No wonder you wouldn't dare give my Chloe any medicine.
"If anything happens to my precious girl because of you, could you even afford the consequences?
"Julian, did you hear what she just said? She actually dared to disrespect you!"
The patients and their families waiting in line shot sidelong glances at them.
Julian furrowed his brows tightly.
He looked around, feeling humiliated, and finally growled in a low, harsh voice, "Enough! When is this drama going to end?"
Penelope froze, caught off guard by his roar.
Her eyes welled up with tears, and she bit her lip, looking pitiful and aggrieved, not daring to make another sound.
Julian took a deep breath and then turned to me, his eyes complicated, filled with a mix of patronizing sympathy and disapproval.
He said, "Vivian, Penelope was just too anxious and blurted things out. Don't take it to heart. But..."
He paused, his gaze fixing on the name tag on my chest, and his frown grew even deeper.
He added, "You should change your job.
"When we got divorced, I gave you a house. That should be more than enough for you to get by. Why keep working at something people sneer at?
"Isn't it unlucky, dealing with corpses every day?"
Sneered at? Unlucky?
I looked at the flicker of disdain in his eyes. It was so absurd I could hardly believe it.
I almost wanted to laugh.
Five years ago, just to look after those so-called "noble hands" that wielded a scalpel, I quit my job as a post-mortem restoration specialist, traded my career for cooking and cleaning, and let myself become a frumpy, worn-out wife.
And what did I get for it? He just said, "You stay at home all day. You don't understand my world at all."
Five years later, I went back to my old profession. With my skills, I became a top post-mortem restoration specialist, well-respected, pulling in a four-hundred-thousand-dollar salary.
In his eyes, I was still just someone he thought was beneath him.
It turned out that when someone didn't love me, even if I became a light, they would only find me blinding.
I was just about to snap back when a coat, carrying the lingering warmth of its owner, settled around me.
A fresh, cool scent instantly enveloped me, sweeping away the hospital's heavy disinfectant smell and shielding me from Julian's sour odor.
"Why are you wearing so little right after getting off work? The weather's getting chilly. You'll feel awful if you catch a cold."
A gentle, deep male voice spoke from above my head.
I turned around and saw Dominic Hayes standing right behind me.
He stood tall, carrying a bag of handmade food from my favorite spot.
He didn't even glance at Julian.
He just naturally adjusted my collar for me, his gaze so gentle it was almost liquid.
He said, "Let's go. The car's already warm."
Dominic was the youngest chief of cardiothoracic surgery at First City Hospital, a genius in the field of medicine.
He was also Julian's biggest rival back then.
And now, he was my fiancé, officially.