Hadley slowly lowered her hand, shaking her head, her tear-filled eyes locking onto his with quiet devastation.

Eric recoiled slightly. She… she was crying? Was it something he said?

“I’m sorry!” Eric blurted immediately.

“This is all my fault! I should’ve asked—I shouldn’t have assumed!”

He paced back and forth in agitation.

“Please, don’t cry! I was wrong—I’m so sorry! Please forgive me!”

Hadley remained frozen, unmoving—his words mere background noise. All she saw was a stranger in front of her, a man speaking lines that didn’t belong to the world they once shared.

Eric’s face grew hazy before her eyes. Hadley simply closed her eyes—tears spilling over.

Images danced before her. She remembered the day clearly—the very words she’d spoken to him: “Let’s call it off, Eric.”

She had ended it. The decision had been hers. But she never imagined that end meant becoming strangers.

No wonder he hadn’t recognized Joy. It wasn’t because he had someone new. Not because he wanted to start over. It was because… he had entirely erased her from his life.

“Ugh!” A strangled cry broke from her chest as Hadley clutched her heart. The pain hit her like a blade—sharp, deep, unrelenting.

Even when they had parted back then, it hadn’t hurt like this. But in this very moment, as the truth of their past unraveled—every shard of love, every splinter of resentment—the years-long knot that once bound them had been wiped away by him… as effortlessly as pressing delete.

She never thought it would hurt this much.

Why was everything unraveling like this?

Eric stood there, not a scratch on him, whole and unharmed. He looked exactly like the Eric Hadley remembered, but something about him felt unfamiliar, as if she were staring at a stranger.

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Could something have gone wrong during his surgery?

Thinking back, she realized the Scott family had hidden every detail about his recovery. Not even Colleen could uncover anything about what happened.

She also remembered the day she tried to see him at the hospital. Every entrance of the VIP building was guarded by the Scott family’s bodyguards, all on high alert.

Did they shield him so carefully because he ended up like this?

That had to be the answer.

Hadley’s eyes flew open. She stared at Eric, and an icy chill crept through her fingers and toes. He stood before her, fully recovered, but he had wiped her from his mind.

Was this how he chose to get even? All because she had once walked away from him without hesitation?

Unbelievable.

A soundless laugh escaped Hadley’s lips. She knew she had been the one to end things, but this—this was the outcome she never saw coming. He had erased every trace of her from his life. She felt invisible, as though she had never been a part of his world. That was a sharp and deliberate sort of revenge.

“You!” Hadley’s anger boiled over as she grabbed Eric’s tie in a sudden burst. She locked eyes with him, her gaze blazing with outrage.

Her voice came out rough, barely more than a whisper.

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