Mo Yufei

"Happy Anniversary," my husband said, sliding the separation agreement across the mahogany desk. It was the eighteenth time in five years I had signed these papers. Matteo De Luca, the most ruthless Capo in New York, checked his Rolex with cold impatience. "Sign it, Sera. Bianca is on the ledge again. She needs to see we're over, or she jumps." Bianca. The ward. The broken bird. The woman whose fragile psyche dictated every moment of my marriage. I signed my name, and he left me alone on our anniversary to save her. Again. But saving her wasn't enough. When Bianca pushed me down a flight of marble stairs in a fit of jealous rage, shattering my spine and leaving me paralyzed, I thought Matteo would finally choose me. I was wrong. I woke up in the hospital to find him holding her hand, not mine. "The security footage has been wiped," he told me, his voice void of emotion. "We cannot have a scandal. You fell, Sera. That is the story." He erased the truth. He erased my pain. He protected the woman who crippled me over his own wife. Two months later, he wheeled me into a gala, playing the doting husband while I sat in the chair that was my prison. He didn't know I had a burner phone hidden in my velvet dress. He didn't know that tonight, the obedient wife was going to die on the pavement, and a ghost would rise in her place. I looked at him one last time and dropped the phone in his lap. "I hope she's worth it."

I sat in a private hospital suite that cost more than a luxury car, watching the green line on my daughter's heart monitor struggle to climb. Everything shattered when a hospital administrator accidentally dropped a folder, revealing a document with my husband's unmistakable signature. Darius Brandt had personally authorized the "reallocation" of our daughter's donor kidney to his mistress's son just to secure a multi-million dollar corporate merger. When I confronted him, Darius didn't even blink, calling our daughter's life a "liquidated asset" before offering me a five-million-dollar settlement for my silence. In a blind rage, I set our penthouse on fire, choosing to burn with the proof of his betrayal rather than live another day as his puppet. As the flames consumed the room, I couldn't understand how a father could put a price tag on his own child's life. How could he look at our dying daughter and see nothing but a resource to be traded for a European distribution network? But the heat suddenly vanished, replaced by the scent of expensive perfume and the muffled sound of a string quartet. I opened my eyes to find myself staring into a gold-framed mirror at the Brandt Charity Gala, exactly eight years in the past. It was the night my nightmare first began, the night I was framed and forced into a marriage that would eventually kill my child. "I see you, Darius," I whispered to my reflection as I applied a coat of blood-red lipstick. "And this time, I'm not the prey."

My husband tore my ultrasound report to shreds at a gala, publicly declaring me barren to protect his mistress. I was visibly pregnant, but he erased me, our child, and my truth with a single, cruel lie. So I faked my death and disappeared. Five years later, I returned, no longer a fragile wife but a hardened salvage expert with a fortune. I walked into a high-stakes auction where Emerson was the top bidder. I let my son, his spitting image, make the first move. Then, I stepped from the shadows and calmly raised my paddle. "Seven hundred fifty million."

I went to the Department of Vital Records to pick up my four-year-old son's death certificate, but I left with a birth certificate for my husband's illegitimate child. The date of birth was August 14th. My son, Leo, had drowned in October. While I was choosing a casket for our child, Eli had been holding his newborn with another woman. I tried to confront him at a charity gala, but his mistress walked in holding their son's hand. The boy pointed at Eli and innocently asked if they were playing the "game" again—the same game they were playing in the bedroom while Leo wandered into the pool and drowned. The truth shattered me. I screamed, lunging at the monsters who let my son die. But Eli didn't comfort me. He shoved me off the stage to protect his mistress, breaking my leg in front of everyone. Later, to silence me forever, his family had me beaten and dumped under a bridge, leaving me blind and broken in the freezing rain. They thought I was dead. They thought they had won. But I survived. I found a doctor who could perform a radical procedure: Targeted Memory Suppression. I chose to surgically excise Eli Stark from my mind completely. Six months later, I stood on stage as a celebrated neuroscientist, my sight restored and my life reclaimed. A haggard, weeping man approached me with a massive diamond ring, begging for a second chance. I looked at him with clear, unrecognizing eyes and asked, "Excuse me, do I know you?"

I was the substitute bride, the secret illegitimate daughter forced to marry the billionaire Fletcher Dillon when my perfect half-sister ran away. My life was a quiet hell of his cruelty and control. Then, my sister Aislinn came back. At a party, she pushed us both into the bay. As I struggled for air, I watched Fletcher dive in and save her, leaving me to drown. When I found out I was pregnant, he dragged me to a hospital to "get rid of the obstacle." The procedure nearly killed me. Then Aislinn framed me for theft, and Fletcher had me whipped until I bled on the marble floor. He told me my life belonged to him, that I was a toy he could break and repair as he pleased. I was nothing more than a cheap replacement for the woman he truly wanted. So when kidnappers forced him to choose between saving Aislinn or me, he sacrificed me without hesitation. As they dragged me away, I saw him comforting her, his back turned to me. This was my chance. I broke free and plunged into the ocean as a bullet grazed my skin. It was time for everyone to believe I was dead.

I was naked in the bed of the most dangerous Capo in New York when I heard his mind whisper the name of the woman he actually wanted. It wasn't me. My husband, Dante, moved over me with cold precision, but his thoughts were screaming for Sofia, a soldier's widow he claimed to protect out of "honor." I possess a secret that makes me a freak: I can hear the thoughts of men. And Dante’s mind was a torture chamber of devotion to another woman. I found the deed to a luxury penthouse he bought for her. I watched her parade around in a dress he bought for me, hearing her mental triumph as she thought about rubbing her scent all over it. Refusing to be a placeholder in my own marriage, I left my wedding ring on his desk and fled to Las Vegas to build my own empire. I thought I had escaped. Until the divorce papers arrived in the mail, signed by him. I stood in my shop, heartbroken, believing he had finally discarded me to be with his true love. But then the phone rang. "Dante didn't sign those papers, Elena. He’s in the ICU." My blood ran cold. "He took two bullets to the chest. He started a war to distract the enemy from finding you." He hadn't chosen her. He was dying for me. I tore up the papers and booked a private jet. If the Grim Reaper wanted my husband, he would have to get through me first.

I thought marrying Noah Harrison was my fairytale. He gave up everything for me – his family, his fortune. He said, "You're all that matters." Then his older brother died, and Noah became the sole heir. His family dragged him back, and I watched as he was molded into a stranger. A stranger whose intimacy was now shared with his widowed sister-in-law, Olivia, in the library, whispers of an heir filling the air. His mother, Mrs. Harrison, began my "training," each lesson a cut, reminding me of my "humble origins." When I found myself pregnant, a secret joy amidst the cruelty, I thought it would save us. I was so wrong. I overheard Mrs. Harrison whisper, "A child from her would be a stain on the family line. We must handle it." After a forced cup of tea, I miscarried violently in a cold hospital room. Then, a chilling clarity broke through my medicated haze. I heard the doctors, talking to Noah outside my room. "A hysterectomy is the only way to prevent future complications." Noah' s voice was firm, "Do it. Whatever it takes to protect her." I believed him. But then I found his locked journal. The pages laid out a truth colder than ice: the miscarriage was orchestrated, the surgery was not to save my life, but to ensure I could never bear a child, never challenge Olivia's secret pregnancy. He had ordered the removal of my uterus to secure his inheritance, to keep me a barren, placid wife. The man who sacrificed everything for me had sacrificed me for everything. The naive girl was gone. Now, only escape remained. I would fake my own death, and it would be spectacular.

The last thing I remember was the gnawing hunger, locked in the shed by my parents who believed my adopted sister' s outrageous lie. "I'm a time-traveler!" Britney had shrieked, claiming I'd ruined our family in a past life and killed them. My own parents, without a single question, bought her story, seeing her as a savior and me, their biological child, as a monster. They bound me, broke my limbs, and left me for dead in our dark, dank basement, all to ensure Britney got everything I had worked for. How could they be so blind, so cruel, so willing to believe a fantasy over their own daughter? Then, I opened my eyes to sunlight, my body whole, only to hear Britney' s cheerful voice from downstairs, alive, on the very day she claimed to be a time-traveler.

The organ music swelled, sunlight streaming through stained-glass windows, painting colored patterns on the white roses lining the aisle. It was my wedding day, perfectly planned for over a year, and I was walking down the aisle to marry Mark, the perfect fiancé. But as I reached the altar, a cold knot formed in my stomach, not the rush of love I expected. When the priest asked, "Do you, Sarah Miller, take this man, Mark Davis, to be your lawfully wedded husband?" I could only think of Betsy, my golden retriever. Then the word slipped out. "No." The church erupted in gasps. My mother' s handkerchief fell. Mark' s smile froze. This was because Betsy, my wise, old dog, had refused to come with me this morning. She just sat in the yard and wouldn' t move. "She knows," I told Mark, pulling my hands from his. "She's always been my sign. Her refusing to come here... it means this is wrong. This marriage is wrong." The murmuring turned to outright condemnation. "Crazy." "Unbelievable." Mark hissed, "You're calling off our wedding because your dog had a weird morning?" My father grabbed my arm, threatening, "You are going back in there and finishing this ceremony." I lunged, screaming, "Don't you touch her!" In that moment, everything changed. I knew I had to act, not just for myself, but for the intuition Betsy represented. My decision was clear: this wedding was off, and I was walking away from everything I thought I knew.

For six years, I' ve been Alex Miller in name only, living as an invisible servant and punching bag in my own home, a twisted marriage forced upon me to save my family. One seemingly normal day, red wine (the same vintage they toasted their anniversary with) shattered on the marble, a glass "accidentally" knocked by Damien, my wife Vivian' s lover. "Clean it up," Vivian sneered, not even looking at me. She then demanded I use my shirt, not my hands, so I wouldn' t scratch her precious floor, while Damien purred fake sympathy, asking if I even remembered what it was like to be a man. The familiar humiliation, a cloak I' d worn for 2,190 days, tightened around me. Why did I endure this daily torment from the wife who saw me as her cage, and her cruel co-conspirator? Then, a quiet call from the hospital delivered a gut punch: my father was dying, and his last wish was to see me free. That spark wasn' t hope, but something sharper. It was rebellion.

The last thing I remember is the cold, seeping into my bones as I froze to death in an abandoned barn. But then, I heard weeping, and snapped my eyes open to find myself sitting on a hard wooden pew, at Andrew' s funeral. My mother-in-law, Debra Chadwick, was there, sobbing about how they' d take care of me and Molly, just as she did twenty years ago. The exact same false promise that had shackled me for two decades, turning me into their live-in nurse and servant until they threw me out to die. The sheer audacity of it, of being brought back only to face the same manipulative lies, surged through me with a hot, sharp rage. Not grief, not confusion, but pure, unadulterated fury. This time, I wouldn't take her sedatives. This time, I shoved her arm off me. This time, everything would be different.

My whole life revolved around Liam, my best friend, the boy I loved. We had a shared dream: journalism, Northwestern, forever. Then, at our graduation party, I overheard him call me "suffocating" and "clingy," admitting he' d lied about our future just to "keep me on a leash." My world shattered. I cut him out, enrolled in NYU alone, and rebuilt my life, finding success and even a supportive, loving boyfriend, Marcus. But Liam, the boy who promised me forever, became a relentless shadow, creeping back into my life, whispering apologies and making desperate, unhinged claims of love. How could someone claim to love you while actively trying to destroy you? What kind of twisted affection drives a person to such lengths? I learned the dark truth: he hadn' t just been cruel, he' d sabotaged my career and then, on my wedding day, drugged and kidnapped me, holding me captive in a glass house overlooking the Pacific. I needed to escape, to prove my unwavering strength, and make him truly understand.

My younger brother, David, clutched his art scholarship, his face beaming with the promise of a future. Our small, cramped apartment, usually filled with textbooks and art supplies, felt like a palace that night. He was seventeen, brilliant, and on the cusp of his dreams. Then, a hard knock on the door, not the friendly kind. Three brutal enforcers from the notorious Rizzo crime family burst in, smashing our world. They shoved me aside, seized David, and I heard screams, crashes, and my brother's desperate cry: "No! My portfolio!" When they finally left, David lay bleeding, his drawing hand bent at a sickening angle, his scholarship certificate torn and stomped on. But the nightmare had only just begun. The police laughed me out of the station, dismissing it as "not clearly an assault." Lawyers turned pale at the Rizzo name, citing "conflict of interest." Our cries for justice were met with chilling threats, online smear campaigns, and my job loss. Frank Rizzo Sr. himself called, gloating, threatening to have David discharged from the hospital. How could they be so powerful, so terrifyingly untouchable? Every avenue for help was blocked. We were just two kids against an powerful empire built on fear and corruption that seemingly owned our entire city. Were we truly fighting a losing battle against evil that had permeated every system? They wanted me to feel utterly hopeless, to break me. But when I saw my Medal of Honor father' s torn uniform photograph amidst the wreckage, a desperate, crazy thought sparked. Washington D.C. The Pentagon. Could a dead hero's forgotten legacy still offer a chance at justice, even when all hope seemed lost in a world gone wrong?

My head pounded, a familiar ache, as I slowly sat up in my dorm room, sunlight streaming through the window. But something was terribly wrong; the last thing I remembered was my farewell party before London, a drink from Brianna, and then a confusing blank. Now, my phone confirmed the impossible: September 5th, move-in day, the exact beginning of my freshman year. A cold dread washed over me, stomach churning, as the door creaked open, revealing Brianna Evans, my new roommate. She was slinging a cheap, shiny black jacket over her arm – a blatant, terrible knock-off of my AllSaints leather jacket, the one I had just worn in my real past. It hit me then: I was trapped in a horrifying loop, forced to relive every cruel detail of the previous timeline. I remembered her subtle digs, the stolen moments, the way she'd mimic me, then twist things until I looked like the villain, the prestigious internship I lost, the friendships she sabotaged, the reputation she systematically destroyed. My blood ran cold, then hot with a fury born of knowing exactly what she was. How could I be back here, forced to endure this slow-motion psychological torture all over again? The sheer unfairness of facing her again, knowing the devastation she' d leave in her wake, was almost unbearable. But deep within me, the old Ash – the one who was kind, accommodating, and always gave the benefit of the doubt – was gone, poisoned out of existence by Brianna's venom. This time, things would be drastically different. The game was on, and though she thought she held all the cards, I knew the rules now. I had a lifetime of future knowledge, and this time, the winner wouldn't be Brianna. My future was finally mine to reclaim.

My new beginning with Michael seemed perfect, especially with his doting mother, Susan, living right next door. She cooked me endless "special" meals and offered "optimal maternal wellness" vitamins, convinced I needed to be strong to start a family. But soon, a persistent fatigue set in. I started feeling weaker, not stronger. Then, I overheard Susan discussing a chilling "plan" where my growing paleness was a "good sign." The sweet meals became a source of dread, the vitamins a silent threat. Desperate, I faked a pregnancy to expose her, only for my husband Michael to confess a shocking secret orchestrated by his own mother: he was sterile. Susan, unfazed, then tried to make me drink a suspicious-looking "calming tea." Why was she systematically poisoning my body and sabotaging my future? What sinister motive lay beneath her doting facade? Was my husband merely a puppet in a game I didn’t understand? With my life and health on the line, I knew I had no choice but to uncover the full, horrifying truth, even if it meant tearing apart the family I thought I married into.

The rumor said Leon was an aloof and clod CEO, who had never fallen for any women. However, a bold woman won his attention and they even spent a wild night. Since then, he got addicted to her and gave her all his adoration. She thought she had his love, but she was only a part of his conspiracy. Failing to take the cruel truth, she gave up and jumped into the inferno. Only when he lost her did he realize the very fact that he had lost his heart to her. That was not the end of their story but a new start.

Ivy Luo is ordinary and optimistic. She drops out of school, works hard, and raises the child for her sister. She goes to a job interview at a grand hotel, but she feels uncomfortable as if having been drugged. Then she runs into a room wanting to calm down herself with water, where she meets this handsome and rich man Edgar. Attracted by his handsome appearance, she takes the initiative and has a one-night stand with him. Later, she finds that he is considerate to her and she loves him back. When his ex-girlfriend comes back, he refuses her resolutely, because he finds that he has fallen in love with Ivy Luo. Would the couple be happy together?

On my wedding day, my father sold me to the Chicago Outfit to pay his debts. I was supposed to marry Alex Moreno, the heir to the city's most powerful crime family. But he couldn't even be bothered to show up. As I stood alone at the altar, humiliated, my best friend delivered the final blow. Alex hadn't just stood me up; he had run off to California with his mistress. The whispers in the cathedral turned me into a joke. I was damaged goods, the rejected bride. His family knew the whole time and let me take the public fall, offering me his cousins as pathetic replacements-a brute who hated me or a coward who couldn't protect me. The humiliation burned away my fear, leaving only cold rage. My life was already over, so I decided to set the whole game on fire myself. The marriage pact only said a Carlson had to marry a Moreno; it never said which one. With nothing left to lose, I looked past the pathetic boys they offered. I chose the one man they never expected. I chose his father, the Don himself.

My marriage to Joshua Caldwell was a prison sentence. I was a Hartman trophy, sold to the powerful family who had destroyed mine. Then I discovered he was cheating. His mistress was pregnant with the child he denied me, and he was stealing my secret song lyrics to build her career. When I confronted him, he called me a spineless liability and threatened to destroy what was left of my family. To make matters worse, a one-night stand with a stranger turned out to be with my husband's brother, Anthony Caldwell-the Don of the city. He knew all of Joshua's secrets and used them to trap me in a twisted game, seeing me as nothing more than an asset. They both thought I was a broken doll they could control. I wrote a song for his mistress, a beautiful execution with a single, impossible note I knew would destroy her voice. She sang it, and now her career is over. Now the Don has summoned me to Chicago, not knowing the woman he thinks is his asset is the one who just burned his brother's world to the ground.

Becoming a bride to settle a debt was never part of my dreams. Yet, my stepbrother's betrayal and a trap party turned my life upside down, shattering my illusions of a joyful marriage. Now, I'm faced with the harsh reality of being married to a ruthless Mafia boss, Alessio Marino. Can I trust his promises, or will my situation be worse than the abuse I endured from my stepbrother? With love stripped from my wedding vows, all I can do is cling to hope for God's mercy and summon the strength to navigate this perilous new life.

My cousin Hailey paid a dock worker to assault me just to ruin my engagement. To survive the military-grade aphrodisiac she poisoned me with, I stumbled into a walk-in freezer and threw myself onto the only source of cold I could find-a man paralyzed by unnatural hypothermia. It was a desperate, primal exchange of my heat for his ice just to keep my heart from stopping. But when Hailey threw open the heavy iron door, leading my fiancé and the entire Bolton family to witness my "shame," her triumphant grin instantly vanished. She hadn't caught me with a low-life thug. She had caught me straddling Demetrius Maddox, the ruthless Iron King of Chicago. The air in the room dropped to absolute zero. My grandmother screamed in horror, and my father turned the color of ash. Hailey, blinded by jealousy, tried to double down. She pointed a manicured finger at the deadliest man in the city and called him a "nameless muscle" I picked up to defile the family name. She didn't realize she had just signed her own death warrant. I didn't cower. I realized this was the only chance to survive the family that wanted me dead. I walked up to the Devil himself, my body still humming with the poison, and looked him in the eye. "Kill me, and the cold inside you wins," I whispered, knowing he was dying from the inverse of my own poison. "I am the only doctor who knows how to cure you." Demetrius tightened his hand around my throat, his dark eyes assessing my worth. "Prove it," he growled. I turned back to my trembling cousin and signaled the enforcer to hand me the whip.

Andrew Hebert, the man who promised to protect me, stood on a stage and announced his engagement to my tormentor. It wasn't just heartbreak; it was a business deal. He was selling me to a creditor to cover his gambling debts. The applause of the powerful families was a death sentence, each clap sealing my fate as collateral. Andrew had paraded me here just to show everyone I was an asset to be liquidated, while his new fiancée smirked at me from the stage. I was trapped, with no money and no one to turn to. The man I loved was leading me to the slaughter. But as I fled into the library, a voice emerged from the shadows, deep and dangerous. Damien Maddox. The Dark Don. The only man Andrew feared. He offered me a different kind of cage, one with the power to burn Andrew's world to the ground. With nothing left to lose, I looked the devil in the eyes. "Take me with you."

I watched my husband sign the papers that would end our marriage while he was busy texting the woman he actually loved. He didn't even glance at the header. He just scribbled the sharp, jagged signature that had signed death warrants for half of New York, tossed the file onto the passenger seat, and tapped his screen again. "Done," he said, his voice devoid of emotion. That was Dante Moretti. The Underboss. A man who could smell a lie from a mile away but couldn't see that his wife had just handed him an annulment decree disguised beneath a stack of mundane logistics reports. For three years, I scrubbed his blood out of his shirts. I saved his family's alliance when his ex, Sofia, ran off with a civilian. In return, he treated me like furniture. He left me in the rain to save Sofia from a broken nail. He left me alone on my birthday to drink champagne on a yacht with her. He even handed me a glass of whiskey—her favorite drink—forgetting that I despised the taste. I was merely a placeholder. A ghost in my own home. So, I stopped waiting. I burned our wedding portrait in the fireplace, left my platinum ring in the ashes, and boarded a one-way flight to San Francisco. I thought I was finally free. I thought I had escaped the cage. But I underestimated Dante. When he finally opened that file weeks later and realized he had signed away his wife without looking, the Reaper didn't accept defeat. He burned down the world to find me, obsessed with reclaiming the woman he had already thrown away.

I was the perfect Mafia wife, my dowry the foundation of my husband's ambition. I paid for his Yale degree, his tailored suits, and the very mansion he called his own. My reward? He paraded his mistress into my bedroom and declared her his second wife, expecting me to silently finance their affair. They thought they had broken a merchant's daughter. They forgot I was raised by wolves. Armed with a blood chit—a life debt owed to my family by the most feared man in Chicago—I walked into the lion's den. I went to Damien 'The Wraith' Falcone, the Dark Don who rules the Outfit with an iron fist, to demand a simple annulment. But the King of Chicago isn't interested in simple transactions. He saw the steel beneath my silk, the vendetta burning in my eyes. He granted me my freedom, but at a price: my allegiance. Now, I'm a pawn in his lethal game of thrones, caught between a treacherous husband I swore to destroy and a ruthless Don who looks at me with a terrifying, possessive hunger. In a city built on loyalty and betrayal, I'm about to teach them all that a queen's wrath is the deadliest weapon of all.

I replaced my twin sister in a marriage contract to the ruthless Mafia Don, Donovan Blackwood. For three years, I was a ghost in his home, silently enduring his coldness while he flaunted his mistress, Chloe. On the very last day of our contract, Chloe staged an accident. Donovan didn't hesitate. He forced me to drain my blood to save her life. Then, to prove his loyalty to her, he drove me to the cliffs and pushed me into the freezing ocean. He even locked me in a cellar infested with spiders—my deepest phobia—because she lied and said I threatened her. He thought he was punishing the spoiled, arrogant Isabella. He didn't know he was breaking Ava, the woman who had silently memorized his allergies and waited up for him in the dark every single night. When I finally took my fifty million dollars and vanished, I left behind nothing but the divorce papers and a photo revealing the truth. He tore the city apart, destroying my family to find me, only to realize he had tortured the wrong woman. Now, he is standing on my porch in the pouring rain, staring in horror at the simple wooden ring on my finger given to me by another man. He falls to his knees, begging for a chance to love the wife he tried to destroy. I look at him, feeling absolutely nothing. "It's too late, Donovan," I say, locking the door. "You killed her."

On my wedding day to Julian Moretti, the future Mafia Don, I was deliberately sent to the wrong penthouse. My half-sister Sofia had crawled into my fiancé's bed, leaving me to be discovered by the family's exiled, alcoholic cousin. In my past life, I was shattered by this orchestrated betrayal. I cried and begged when Julian publicly humiliated me, choosing his illegitimate mistress over his rightful bride. I played the perfect, dignified Mafia wife for years. I swallowed his insults, ignored his infidelities, and accepted my ruined reputation to keep the peace. But my blind obedience only paved the way for my murder. Julian discarded me, and I was poisoned to death so Sofia could steal my crown as the Mafia Queen. Until my agonizing last breath, I didn't understand. I had honored our families' blood alliance flawlessly. Why was I the sacrificial lamb while they were rewarded for their treason? Opening my eyes again, I was back on the dark leather sofa, suffocating in my heavy silk wedding dress. This time, I didn't shed a single tear. I grabbed a heavy brass letter opener, marched straight into the Don's main study, and slapped the Underboss across the face in front of the entire family. "A Valdez woman does not share her husband," I declared coldly. "To honor the alliance, I will marry Dante." If they wanted to make my humiliation a fact, I was going to make it a funeral.

At my boyfriend's poorest moment, I suddenly broke up with him. Later, he became a Don in the Mafia and married me by any means necessary. Everyone said he loved me to the bone. But every night, he brought different women home, deliberately trying to provoke me. I asked no questions, shed no tears, and never disturbed his trysts with his mistresses. He went crazy with rage instead, kissing me fiercely and demanding, "Why aren't you jealous?" He didn't know I was sick. Dying. While he was furiously taking his revenge on me, I was slowly walking toward death.