Felipe’s vision blurred, not knowing when his eyes had grown watery. All he knew was that his heart hurt. It was numbing and suffocating.
Nothing the people around said went through his ears for all he saw was black and a splash of bright red blood.
“Felipe…”
In a daze, Felipe thought he heard the voice he wanted to hear most.
Snapping his head up, his reddened eyes were met with Cathy’s exhausted and squinting ones.
“Cathy. Don’t worry, Cathy. I won’t let you die!” Felipe vowed.
Cathy merely smiled as she raised her bloodied hand with difficulty and placed the USB into Felipe’s hand.
Felipe stared at the USB in shock as the piercing pain spread to his extremities.
He suddenly hated everything he had—especially himself.
“Felipe. I guess this is goodbye…”
Tears streaked his cheeks. “I won’t let anything happen to you, I swear, Cathy. As long as you pull through, I promise we’ll start all over again, okay? I promise.”
Cathy smiled tearfully and sighed. “That’s nice…
“Promise me you won’t do those things again.”
“Alright, I won’t. I won’t do any of it again! I promise!”
Cathy smiled contently as she watched him cry for her. “I never knew you’d feel so upset because of me, Felipe…”
She tried to raise her hand to touch Felipe’s face, only to have it fall heavily just as she softly spoke the last of her sentence.
“Cathy!”
Felipe wailed, the pain of his heart being torn apart seeping into his bones.
Clutching Cathy’s hand against his cheek, he realized that it was growing cold.
Nothing he did seemed to warm her.
The ambulance arrived in no time as they hauled her onto the stretcher.
Felipe knelt despondently as he stared at the pool of blood, his eyes losing their focus…
Cathy was sent to the Royal Hospital.
She was operated on by Felipe’s personal doctor.
The doctor held the highest authority and was the most skilled within the Royal Hospital. He was the one who brought Niamh back to life.
Felipe was certain that he could do the same for Cathy as well.
He had to.
Sitting anxiously by the operating doors, Felipe’s heart refused to calm.
He raised his bloodied hands only to find that the mint-green hairband he had kept carefully with him was now dyed red.
With trembling fingers, he raised the hairband to his lips. “Don’t die. Please, you can’t die.”
He murmured under his breath as his eyes reddened further.
“You promised you’d pester me forever. You can’t go back on your word now.”
Felipe’s voice shook as he repeated himself, unable to put the panic within him to rest.
Just then, the operating room’s door opened to reveal a doctor in a white coat. Felipe immediately ran toward him. “Professor Quinney, how’s Cathy?”
The professor shook his head. “I’ve got the bullet out, but since it hit her heart, I can’t bring her back to life. I’m sorry, but Miss Cathy has passed.”
Frozen in place, Felipe felt his world crack as he stood rooted to the ground.
“How did she just get shot out of the blue? Could it be the Stygian Johnsons?” The doctor sighed, his heart clenching at the loss of such a young life.
Felipe could not answer him, for he knew the answer.
He was the one who killed Cathy.
He was the one who ordered them to shoot.
He thought that she wanted to betray him, that she wanted to destroy everything he had created. Yet the truth showed that she had never betrayed him at all, nor had she let her feelings for him go.
That was why she turned around.
It was him who turned around too late.
It was that split second that he realized how much he cared for Cathy.
He had no idea when it started, but Cathy seemed to have silently made her way into his heart…
Felipe felt the ache in his chest grow by countless folds as he slowly walked into the empty operating room.
He wanted to see her one last time.
However, he did not have the courage to see her face.
His mind was flooded with images of her energetic laughter. The pale and silent memories were all he had left of her.
He walked toward Cathy and leaned down emotionlessly to seal her cold lips with his.
‘In another life, Cathy, let me be the one to chase after you instead.’
…
Niamh may have decided to return to Glendale, but her inability to contact Cathy had her unable to let go and leave.
From Kendrick, she was told that when Cathy tried to kill herself by jumping into the river, she had returned to spy on Felipe because she could not let him go.
It was then that Cathy was found by the Stygian Johnsons and had her appearance marred when they caught her. That was why she did plastic surgery.
She had drifted around F Country for three months when she caught sight of Kendrick running from Felipe’s bodyguards who were trying to kill him. Before the car could explode, she had dragged Kendrick to safety.
The two heartbroken people became close friends due to mutual understanding and encouragement, which explained what happened then.
The so-called engagement party had no witnesses as it was merely for show. After all, Kendrick only had one legal wife—Niamh.
Cathy had played a huge part in repairing Niamh and Kendrick’s relationship, so it was only natural that Niamh was worried when she dropped off the radar.
Even if it was dangerous, she decided that she would make a trip to Felipe’s manor.
Felipe had spent the last few days in despair.
He was locking himself in the room Cathy once stayed in.
Flipping through her photo collage, he stared at the bright and happy girl who then bloomed like a red rose—enchanting and passionate.
Yet the rose had wilted away now.
He was so stubborn, thinking that the woman he loved all along had been Niamh because she was the only ray of light he had when he was a child—the ray of light that broke through his gloomy clouds and brought him back to reality.
When in truth, he found that he would rather live forever in the dark as long as he had his rose. If hell was the destination, he would trek the path as long as she walked with him.
Felipe opened the drawer despite the unbearable heartache to straighten the last of her belongings.
Going through them, his eyes fell on an unexpected item within a light blue brocade box!
Felipe felt his heart pause as he took the item from the box.
He would never forget this red string.
When he met the little girl with the dimpled smile years ago by April Hill’s beach, she had been the ray of light that pulled him out of the dark. She even gave him a rainbow shell.
In return, he gave her a red piece of string.
That day of that year marked his innocent meeting with the energetic and warm Vetty. It was love at first sight.
When he grew up, he found out that the girl was Niamh.
That was why he did everything in his power to make Niamh his.
However, why was the string he had gifted Niamh in Cathy’s hands? Not to mention that it had been kept so safely.
New Book: Back Home to Marry Off Myself
Loredana’s father left the family for his mistress, leaving them to fend for themselves abroad. When life was at its toughest, her father showed up with “good news” after 8 years of absence: To marry off Loredana to a paralyzed son of the wealthy Mendelsohn family.