Chapter 2
Charles finally gave in.
When I pulled up to the bar, he was surrounded by a bunch of spoiled heirs.
They were the infamous party animals everyone in our circle knew about.
Before he lost her memory, Charles barely even talked to people like that.
He always thought they were just freeloaders wasting their lives on their parents' dime.
But after the amnesia, he somehow became one of them.
It didn't take long before someone spotted me.
"Hey, Charles, isn't that your wife?" The man said sarcastically, a sneer on his face, "Well, well, Ms. Bennett, you actually showed up at a place like this? Worried your husband might not come home tonight, so you came to fetch him yourself?"
The whole table burst out laughing.
Only Yulia, sitting right next to Charles, looked sullen.
Figure it out. She was the one trying to seduce my husband; of course, she wouldn't laugh at a joke like that.
Yulia gave me a fierce glare, her eyes guarded and full of frustration.
Charles sat right in the middle of the booth. Apart from looking impatient, he was completely stone-faced, unaffected by my arrival or the banter around him.
He knocked back his drink in one gulp and let out a heavy sigh.
"What a buzzkill," Charles grumbled.
I kept a straight face, forcing myself to ignore Charles's irritation, and said in a low voice, "Come on, let's go home."
Yulia instantly put on her best pout, clinging to Charles's arm and saying, "Charles, I'm not ready to leave yet."
Charles's expression was full of sympathy as he hurriedly wrapped his arms around Yulia, murmuring gentle reassurances.
The two were practically glued together, lost in their own world and oblivious to everyone else.
I stood off to the side, looking like the bad guy trying to split up a pair of lovebirds.
Even the spoiled heirs hanging around couldn't help but cringe at the scene.
But they weren't trying to help me out; they wanted to fan the flames and make things even messier.
"Ms. Bennett, we're having a blast here. Isn't it a bit much for you to crash the party and spoil our fun?" one of them said.
He grabbed a bottle of whiskey and shot me a playful look.
He said, "Hey, we're not totally unfair. Here's the deal. down this bottle, and you can take her home."
I frowned, about to refuse, but Charles was here for the show.
"Our family has business ties. I'm here for a deal, and if he says no, I guess I'm stuck," Charles said.
He sprawled out in the booth, watching me with amused eyes, clearly waiting to see how I'd handle this mess.
Our relationship had been pretty strained these days.
But the elders in the Evans family had always been good to me, so I could never bring myself to do anything that might hurt their business.
Right now, it was clear they were giving me a hard time.
If I didn't go along with it, they could easily throw a wrench in the Evans family's business with them.
I picked up the bottle, and catching a whiff made me feel a bit nauseous.
I had a bad stomach for years.
I was even hospitalized several times because of it.
Back then, Charles would run around every day, learning all sorts of stomach-friendly recipes for me.
He was the heir to a wealthy family, but for my sake, he'd put on an apron and clumsily try to figure out how to make all those dishes.
"If you don't behave and end up in the hospital again because of your stomach, then I'll just go out and binge eat until I mess myself up, too," he had said.
He would fix me with a stubborn pout.
It was like my health was the only thing that mattered to him.
The Charles I used to know, and the one sitting here now, overlapped in my mind, but somehow, they couldn't become the same person.
With everyone watching, and Charles's eyes full of amusement, I raised the bottle to my lips.
"Alright, I'll drink," I said.