Chapter 4

As the force of his palm rushed toward me, he met my red-rimmed eyes. He seemed to finally snap back to reality for a second, intending to lower his hand. But because of his strength, his wedding ring still grazed my cheek, leaving a thin cut.

“Dead woman’s junk.” I stood frozen, my heart turning to ash as I repeated his words. “Fine, I get it.”

I turned around and instructed the movers to take the things and leave immediately. But he chased after me.

“Harper!” He grabbed my hand, a rare look of guilt on his face. “I’m sorry, I didn’t know Seraphina would burn your mother’s things.”

“But she’s pregnant, it might be hormones, her emotions are unstable.”

“You’ve never been a mother, can’t you be more understanding of her? I’ll go get new copies of your mother’s things…”

I sharply pulled my hand away, looking at his face, which was already regaining its ‘rational analysis’ look. “Julian, I’ll hire the best lawyers to expedite our divorce proceedings.”

“You!”

Julian was about to chase after me again, but Seraphina cried out in pain, and he immediately turned and ran back into the villa.

After settling my things, I blocked all of Julian’s contact information. I didn’t see him again until a week later at a banquet.

This banquet invited many CEOs from biopharmaceutical companies. Julian never used to come to such ‘corrupting’ places, but now, because of the sudden withdrawal of crucial funds, he had no choice but to seek help here.

He still had no idea that the person behind that money was me.

“Oh my, Ms. Harper, why are you here?” Seraphina covered her mouth, seemingly very surprised. “This place is full of professionals in biomedicine. The discussions aren’t about stocks or funds.”

“Someone like Ms. Harper, do you even understand?”

Her voice was clear, as if she wanted everyone around to mock my out-of-place presence. But everyone simply gave her a strange look and turned away.

“I’m standing here because this banquet is *my* event. Every glass of wine Ms. Seraphina is drinking right now is paid for with *my* money.”

“Without me, how do you think these bigwigs would grace us with their presence?”

The resentment and jealousy in Seraphina’s eyes instantly overflowed. The next second, Julian actually dismissed her and stood next to me, holding a wine glass.

I knew he had networked around, found no one willing to invest in his project, and so he came to me.

“Harper, even if you want a divorce, our joint assets are half yours, half mine…”

Even he struggled to say such shameless words. I chuckled, then slowly said, “Mr. Julian, did you forget the prenuptial agreement we signed?”

“To prove your integrity, didn’t you personally sign an agreement for separate property, terrified to taint yourself with my ‘dirty money’?”

Julian’s face immediately turned ugly, secretly regretting it. But he wanted to use our past relationship to make me soften, but I was utterly unmoved. I only spoke of “divorce.”

“No, I’m afraid my money would dirty your experiments.”

“Harper, are you really going to take it this far?” He gasped, all traces of his refined demeanor were gone. He thrust the wine glass towards me.

“Fine then, if you have the guts, drink this, and we go our separate ways, and it’s over for good!”

I took the glass without hesitation and drank it all. But after I finished, I noticed that Julian’s eyes, besides anger, held a hint of panic.

No, this drink…

A wave of dizziness hit me. My vision went black, and I collapsed.