Crashing into His Vengeance

The night Julian won the Formula 1 Monaco Grand Prix.

I clutched a pregnancy test showing "positive" in one hand and carried a celebratory cake in the other as I quietly pushed open the door.

I thought this would be the second surprise he received tonight.

Instead, through the crack in the door, I saw him entangled with a lover.

A woman's coquettish pleas mixed with the sound of tearing fabric, grating against my eardrums like a rusty saw.

Then I heard it. The secret that negated the last five years of our lives.

"Every moment of affection I've acted out these past five years makes me sick. If her mother—that bitch—hadn't crawled into my father's bed and destroyed my home, I wouldn't have had to use her daughter to settle the debt."

"On the night of the charity gala, I'm going to give her mother a real surprise."

At Julian's vicious words, the pregnancy test almost slipped from my trembling fingers.

So, it was all a lie.

The five years we spent in love were just a long-conceived revenge plot.

His promise to give me a future was fake.

He was taking me to the charity gala next week to meet my parents, but it was only to publicly humiliate my mother.

The woman he viewed as his enemy.

I pressed myself against the cold wall, my fingernails digging into the wallpaper until they nearly broke.

I retreated step by step into the bathroom, my trembling hands locking the door.

I dialed my mother, Catherine.

"Mom, did you know a man named Lucas?"

It was the name of his father, a name Julian had once mentioned casually.

On the other end of the line, I heard the sound of something being knocked over.

"Who told you about this? Lizzie, that was a sin of the past generation..."

"I just need to know. Did he leave behind an illegitimate son before he died... named Julian?" I bit my lip until I tasted rust.

There was a long silence on the other end.

"Yes," my mother answered.

I closed my eyes, tears sliding down my cheeks.

Julian's words from the bedroom echoed in my ears again.

"She destroyed my home, forced my mother to overdose and die, and left me to scavenge for food like a dog in foster care. This debt must be paid."

My mother's voice became panicked. "That child was sent away for adoption after both parents died. Why are you suddenly asking this?"

I took a deep breath, forcing a smile onto my face that was uglier than crying. "It's nothing, Mom. Just asking."

After hanging up, I shoved the pregnancy test into the deepest corner of my pocket.

Back in the living room, my gaze fell upon Julian's laptop on the table.

Ghost-like, I clicked on a folder on the desktop named: My Light.

There were hundreds of photos of Alexandra.

Every single photo radiated the photographer's warmth and love.

There was even a sub-document named "Plan."

It contained a stock analysis of the Whitmore Group and several drafts of press releases designed to ruin both my reputation and my mother's.

A single tear crashed onto the trackpad.

So that was it.

For me, it was a calculated scheme at every step; for Alexandra, she was unreservedly "Julian's Light."

"What are you doing?"

I whipped my head around.

Julian stood at the door. That pair of eyes that used to look at me with such tenderness were now terrifyingly sinister.

I pointed at the brilliant smiling face of Alexandra on the screen.

"Is Alexandra your 'Light'?"

Hearing my question, Julian's lazy gaze instantly narrowed as he strode over.

He shut the laptop with violent force.

"Who gave you permission to touch my things?"

It was the first time I had ever seen such a hideous expression on his face.

My eyes were red, my voice trembling. "I wanted to borrow your computer... I opened the file by mistake."

Actually, I should have guessed.

Six months ago, at the racecourse, I saw him staring at Alexandra's back, lost in thought.

That gaze—focused, burning, even harboring a trace of reverence.

Jealous, I had tested him. "You seem to like watching Alexandra?"

At the time, Julian just rubbed my hair, his tone flawlessly gentle:

"Don't be silly. I just think her side profile looks a bit like my late mother."

"Seeing her reminds me of the only warm days of my childhood."

And I believed him.

I even hugged him with heartache, vowing to give him more love.

Thinking back now.

I was a massive joke.

Julian closed in on me, the scent of tobacco mixed with Alexandra's perfume making me nauseous.

"Alexandra is... important to me."

"When I was at my most desperate, living like a stray dog at the bottom of the world, it was Alexandra who saved me. She is my confidante. My soulmate. A feeling that a high-born princess like you, who only knows how to take, could never understand."

Every word was like a poison-dipped dagger, stabbing precisely into my heart, twisting, and pulling out.

The corner of my mouth hooked into a bitterly tragic smile.

"Just a soulmate?"

Seeing my pain, a flash of pleasure replaced the initial impatience in Julian's eyes.

"Yes."

For five years, Julian and I had gotten along perfectly.

He was the King of the Track, and I was the Piano Princess.

We were supposed to be a match made in heaven.

But tonight, the night he won the championship, and just as the child in my womb turned four weeks old...

I saw the bloody truth.

I clutched the pregnancy test in my pocket tightly.

I wanted to take it out and question him.

I wanted to tell him we had a child.

But in this moment, looking at this man full of lies, I didn't dare.

I always knew that my father's friend, Lucas, had left behind an illegitimate son who was abandoned by the family.

I also knew that the child's mother, Madeline, had always viewed my mother as the enemy who ruined her life.

But I never dreamed...

That the illegitimate son, consumed by hatred and lying in wait for revenge...

Was Julian, the man who had shared my bed for five years.

I spoke softly, asking one final question.

"Julian, apart from this... is there anything else you're keeping from me?"