The Engagement Ring He Forgot, the Fortune He’ll Never Touch cahpter 08

The Engagement Ring He Forgot, the Fortune He’ll Never Touch cahpter 08

The humiliation Bennett suffered at the gala didn’t make him give up.

When begging and pleading got him nowhere, he reached for the only weapon he thought he had left—the hardships we’d endured together.

He’d convinced himself that if he could drag me back through those memories, he might just stir up some trace of old feeling in me.

One week later.

My motorcade had just stopped at a red light at a major intersection when the driver suddenly hit the brakes.

“Ms. Hartwell.” My assistant frowned from the front passenger seat.

“It’s that vagrant again. He’s squatting on the curb up ahead, blocking our route.”

I stared through the rain-streaked window.

Bennett—soaked to the bone, squatting at the roadside like a beggar.

In his hand, he was gripping a piece of moldy bread covered in green fuzz.

His eyes were red as he stared at my license plate.

Then, right in the middle of the storm, he tore off a bite and forced himself to chew.

Rainwater streamed down his face. He swallowed with obvious difficulty.

He was trying to recreate the past. Back when our startup had failed.

Back when we were broke and trapped in that leaking basement.

Back when we’d shared moldy bread because we couldn’t afford anything else.

In his mind, he thought that if he put himself through the same misery again, I would run out to him.

He believed I would cry, hug him, and forgive everything.

Too bad, he’d read the room wrong.

I pressed the window control. The tinted window lowered by a third.

The moment Bennett saw it move, his entire body shook.

He clutched the half-eaten bread, got to his feet, and ran toward the car. His face was soaked.

His voice trembled with excitement.

“Adelaide! You still care about me, don’t you? You remember this bread, right?”

“Back then, we used to…”

I didn’t even look at him.

I turned to my assistant. “Jason.”

My assistant Jason caught on right away.

He opened his briefcase and pulled out a check that had been prepared well in advance.

Without expression, he extended it through the window and slapped it directly against Bennett’s face.

Bennett froze. He stared down at it, stunned.

“W-What’s this?”

I leaned back against the leather seat and looked at him through the open window. A cold smile touched my lips.

My voice was calm. “Bennett. Back then, you spent one month in that leaking basement with me, eating moldy bread.”

His expression shifted. A sense of dread flashed through his eyes.

I went on, every word landed like a verdict.

“That check is for ten million dollars.”

“I calculated the value of your cheap suffering at the highest possible price.”

The color drained from Bennett’s face.

“Adelaide…” His voice shook. “Are… are you trying to buy me off?”

“You’re using money to humiliate everything we had?”

I let out a short, cold laugh. “Humiliate you?”

My gaze sharpened. “You’re not worthy of that.”

He went still.

I looked at him the way you’d look at a settled account.

“From this day forward, that favorite line of yours — ‘I suffered with you’ — I’m buying it.”

My smile vanished. “Completely. I’m buying every last word.”

“Don’t you ever throw that disgusting self-pitying garbage at me again.”

The rain hammered against the car roof.

Inside, my voice remained perfectly calm.

“Your suffering — I’ve paid for it. We’re square.”

“If you ever try to use the past to manipulate me again, my attorneys will sue you for harassment and extortion.”

My eyes met his. “Now get out of my way.”

“No… No!” The moldy bread slipped from his hand. Bennett finally shattered.

“I don’t want the money!” His voice cracked into a scream. “I only want you!”

Desperately, he tried to shove the ten-million-dollar check back through the window.

But the window was already rising—slowly, relentlessly—until his reflection vanished behind the dark tint.

In that moment, the last pillar holding up his world collapsed.

He had repeated that story for years.

He believed he suffered alongside me, that I owed him, and that I could never fully walk away.

I destroyed that belief with a single check.

And for the first time, Bennett understood.

In my eyes, he was no longer the man who had shared hardship with me.

He wasn’t even someone capable of making me feel indebted.

He had become nothing more than a beggar.

A man trying to trade a few dollars’ worth of shabby memories for a fortune he had no right to claim.

The traffic light turned green.

The motorcade pulled away.

Mud and rainwater splashed high into the air, drenching Bennett from head to toe.

He collapsed in the middle of the muddy road.

One hand clutching the moldy bread. The other gripping the ten-million-dollar check.