Ficorpio
Chapter 1
As I tended the kitchen stove, a line of floating text appeared before my eyes.
[The heroine is about to burn her own university admission letter. Let the suffering begin.]
Just then, Adrian Sterling handed me a discarded cardboard box.
“Burn this,” he said. “There’s nothing useful in it.”
[Her admission letter is inside that box! If she burns it, she’ll never get another chance to attend university.]
[She’ll be trapped at home caring for her mother-in-law and spend most of her life alone. Meanwhile, the male lead will take the other woman to Kingsbridge, where they’ll secretly have a child together. Only when he’s old, paralyzed, and abandoned by his mistress will he realize the heroine was the one he truly loved. Then they’ll have their second-chance reconciliation.]
I stared blankly at the floating comments, forgetting what I was doing.
Adrian urged me, “Hurry up and burn it. It’s only taking up space.”
I reached for the lid, but his expression changed. His voice sharpened with urgency.
“They’re old documents I don’t need. You wouldn’t understand them anyway. Just burn them.”
In the past, whenever Adrian showed signs of losing his temper, I never defied him.
This time appeared to be no different.
Only after he watched me toss the box into the stove’s firebox did he turn and leave.
The moment his footsteps faded, I snatched it back out.
Fortunately, the fire had already gone out. Adrian rarely entered the kitchen, so he hadn’t noticed.
My hands trembled as I opened the box.
Inside lay a university admission letter.
The sight of my own name printed across it, Claire Bennett, made my eyes sting.
I hid the letter and left the kitchen. Voices drifted from the sitting room.
“Mom, don’t worry,” Adrian said. “Claire burned her own admission letter. She’ll stay here and take good care of you while I take Lily to Kingsbridge.”
Martha Sterling sounded uneasy. “What if Claire finds out the truth?”
Adrian gave a scornful laugh. “She burned the letter herself. Who can she blame? If it ever comes up, we’ll just say we forgot it was in the box.”
[The male lead is disgusting.]
[This is an abuse-romance narrative. The heroine suffers at first, but the satisfying part comes later, when he’s punished and tries to win her back.]
[Satisfying? He gets to spend his youth with his mistress, then crawls back to the heroine only when he’s old and unwanted.]
[So she’s supposed to wait eighteen years in misery for eighteen days as his cherished wife? What a bargain.]
Something inside me finally went still.
Only now did I fully believe the floating comments.
Chapter 2
Adrian had never intended to take me to Kingsbridge. To him, I was nothing more than an unpaid servant he could leave behind in Meadowbrook Village to care for his mother.
Silence fell inside the room.
When Adrian saw me enter, his voice turned cold.
“Lily was accepted into university, but her family is too poor to pay the tuition. How much money do you have left?”
“I don’t have any.”
Adrian froze. I had always obeyed him without question. He clearly hadn’t expected me to show him even the slightest displeasure.
A mocking look crossed his face. “Lily has no one left to rely on. Don’t you think you owe her something?”
My heart clenched violently.
My father, Thomas Bennett, had been a decorated flood-rescue hero. During the flood, he had saved Adrian first because Adrian was closer to him. By the time he went back for Lily Hayes’s father, it was too late.
My father had held Adrian above the floodwaters until rescuers reached him. But Thomas had exhausted the last of his strength. The current swept him away, and he never surfaced again.
“If my father were still alive, I wouldn’t have to worry about tuition. I…”
At some point, Lily Hayes had slipped into the house. She dabbed at her tears, her voice trembling with practiced helplessness.
Though she was a village girl, she had delicate, pretty features. With tears shimmering in her eyes, she looked especially pitiful.
[How is any of this Claire’s fault? Has the male lead lost his mind? In a rescue, you save whoever is closest first.]
I turned to Adrian, trembling. “So you resent my father because he sacrificed his life to save yours?”
Adrian’s expression darkened. “I could’ve made it to shore on my own. Your father only saved me because he knew you liked me, didn’t he? Now you’ve gotten your wish and you’re going to marry me. What more do you want?”
Absurd.
It was utterly absurd.
He had reduced my father’s heroic sacrifice to a selfish scheme.
Rage overwhelmed me. I opened my mouth, but no words came out.
Lily tugged at Adrian’s sleeve. “Adrian, please don’t blame Claire. She’s only upset because she didn’t get into university.”
Ignoring me as though I weren’t there, Adrian took out a handkerchief and gently wiped away her tears.
“I’ll find a way to cover your tuition and living expenses. Don’t worry.”
Lily gave him a grateful smile, her eyes curving sweetly. “Adrian, I made rice with foraged greens. Come over and try some. Once we leave for Kingsbridge, we won’t get to eat food like that anymore.”
Then she glanced cautiously at me. “Claire won’t be angry, will she?”
Adrian gave a cold snort. “Forget about her. She owes you far too much already.”
Chapter 3
With that, the two of them left together. Their shoulders nearly touched as they walked, their silhouettes so perfectly matched that they could have been a couple already.
The Hayes family had always been one of the poorest households in Meadowbrook Village. Even when George Hayes was alive, he had been bedridden and unable to work. Since Adrian and I had grown up together, I often asked him to come with me to help the Hayes family with farm chores.
But at some point, Adrian had started going to their house alone.
Martha Sterling, who had watched the entire scene in silence, finally looked at me with a helpless sigh.
“Adrian was only speaking out of anger. He thinks of Lily as a younger sister, nothing more. Just coax him when he comes back. A woman has to learn to accommodate her man if she wants to win his heart.”
After my father died, Martha had wept before the entire village and promised to treat me like her own daughter. When she realized I had feelings for Adrian, she immediately arranged our marriage.
Now I understood. Her kindness had always been a mask. She had known about her son’s plans, yet she still intended to push me straight into the fire.
I made up an excuse to go into town and bought a ticket for the next day’s train to Kingsbridge.
I never wanted to see any of them again.
The floating reader comments erupted.
[Claire’s going to university in Kingsbridge? Then how is the male lead supposed to suffer while trying to win her back?]
[Once she gets to Kingsbridge, she’ll catch Adrian and Lily living together as husband and wife. Won’t that make things even more dramatic?]
I smiled.
Adrian still thought he was going to Kingsbridge?
Not a chance.
Adrian Sterling was a doctor at Meadowbrook Community Hospital. He had only been offered a place in the advanced training program at Kingsbridge University Hospital because he was supposed to become Thomas Bennett’s son-in-law.
But what if he wasn’t?
If Adrian believed marrying me was nothing more than repayment for my father saving his life, then I simply wouldn’t marry him.
I went back to Aunt Helen’s house and told her what I had decided.
She was delighted. “I’ve always thought that boy was too cold toward you. He would never have made you happy.”
She immediately called Uncle Robert at his office in Ashford County Seat and asked him to withdraw the marriage authorization form Adrian and I had submitted. Fortunately, it hadn’t been approved yet, so it could still be voided.
By the time I returned home, evening had fallen.
Laughter drifted from inside the house.