Chapter 2
Jenny hung up. When she turned around, Samuel was standing behind
her.
“Who were you talking to?”
His voice was still thick with desire, a towel slung low on his hips, skin damp from the shower.
Jenny looked away, expression flat. “I was calling the cemetery. You’ll need it soon enough.”
Samuel’s expression changed. “Jenny, you… You hate talking about death.”
She nodded.
This book had been added on your bookshell.
Even when the doctors said his condition was irreversible, she refused to buy a plot or plan a funeral. She clung to hope with everything she had.
But now?
Now she just wanted him to hurry up and fake his death. She needed that death certificate. Otherwise, how was she supposed to remarry?
Expressionless, she said, “Honey, you said you’ve only got 30 days left. The cemetery, the funeral–I’ll handle it. I promise to make it grand.”
Every word came out smooth and calm, but Samuel’s face darkened.
He’d tried for so long to get her to accept his so–called death. But now that she finally had, why did it feel so suffocating?
Chapter 2
Before he could analyze her tone, Nadya’s footsteps echoed down the hall.
She walked in looking like a goddess after a good night, wearing Jenny’s nightgown.
Without a hint of shame, she threw her arms around him. “Babe, my legs feel so weak. Carry me to breakfast?”
“Of course, girl…”
Samuel responded like a man drunk on love, his every move dripping. with intimacy.
Even the maid couldn’t bear to watch. But Jenny? She calmly sat across
from them at the table.
Her clothes, her home, her husband–they all belonged to someone else
now.
So what? She’d belong to someone else soon, too.
Their wedding photo? She tossed it.
Those pottery mugs they made together? She smashed them.
The notebooks she once filled with Samuel’s preferences–ten of them, over ten years–she tore them all up and burned them to ash.
When Samuel and Nadya came back from two carefree days at Disneyland, the house looked gutted.
He frowned. “Did we get robbed? Even the bed in the main bedroom’s gone.”
Jenny greeted him with a bright, fake smile. “I was worried Ms. Loretta might not like my taste, so I got rid of everything I bought.”
Samuel felt something was off, but didn’t press.
Instead, he turned to her and asked, “Didn’t you sign up for that violin. competition tomorrow? Drop out.”
“Why?”
For the first time in days, her deadpan face flickered with emotion.
This wasn’t just any contest–it was a global audition for the world’s top orchestra. First place meant a shot at becoming concertmaster.
Jenny had been playing since she was three. Touring the world with an orchestra was her dream. A dream she shelved the moment she married Samuel.
But now her husband was about to “die.” It was time to pick it back up.
Yet Samuel said it like it was obvious, “First place is Nadya’s. You’re not competing.
“No way!”
Jenny stared him down, her voice steady and cold as she said, “I already gave up my husband. Now you want me to give up my dream, too?”
At the competition the next day, Nadya’s eyes burned with hostility.
Jenny ignored her. When it was her turn to tune her instrument, she played a short passage from the contest piece.
It was just a soundcheck, but she treated it like the real performance.
She barely played a few bars, and the chaotic buzz of the crowd went dead silent.
Several judges, still finding their seats, froze mid–step and turned toward
Chapter 2
the stage–toward her.
But Jenny didn’t notice. She was too focused, too immersed.
When she finished tuning, she left the stage to find the restroom.
The moment she stepped into the hallway, a hand shot out from the shadows. She didn’t even get the chance to scream–something clamped over her mouth and nose, and she was dragged into a waiting truck.
The metal doors slammed shut behind her. Locked. And then the truck started to shake.
