Everest's Guardian Hubby Watched Me Freeze My Ghost Knows Where He'll Burn novel Chapter 41

Chapter 1

So this was heartbreak—the kind that scorches every fiber of your being, leaving your chest ablaze with a dull, relentless ache.

I reached for my phone, fingers trembling as I dialed a number I hadn’t touched in years.

“Aunt Annie, I’m coming with you to Africa,” I said, my voice steady despite the storm inside me.

Without waiting for a response, I ended the call and quickly hailed a cab.

Outside the window, the city lights blurred into streaks, mirroring the chaotic, wasted decade I had spent entangled with Sean Winters.

At first, I was his official girlfriend, the one by his side in the daylight.

But then he told me, “Lanie, we come from different worlds. My mother would never accept us.”

He reassured me, “Lanie, this is just a business arrangement. Charlotte and I—there’s nothing between us. You have to trust me.”

On the day of their wedding, he even forced me to meet his ‘wife’ face-to-face, as if to cement my place in his life.

That radiant heiress swirled her wine glass with practiced ease and smiled—a smile that cut deeper than any knife.

“Don’t feel bad, Miss Brooke,” she said smoothly. “I have someone I love, too. Sean and I are just business partners.”

“We’ll get divorced when the timing’s right. Just be patient.”

Seven years.

I had been patient for seven long years.

Looking back now, I see they had endless chances to end it, to be free.

Maybe it wasn’t that they couldn’t get divorced. Maybe they simply didn’t want to.

—

I pressed my nails into the soft skin of my thigh, trying to anchor myself to something real, but the pain was distant, overshadowed by the ache inside. Quiet tears traced silent paths down my cheeks.

I had been tempted—so incredibly tempted.

But I couldn’t leave Sean.

He had clung to me, tears streaming down his face through the night.

Then, in a reckless act of devotion, he had tattooed my name over his heart.

The Winters family had strict rules—no tattoos allowed, ever.

—

But he broke that rule for me.

That was why I loved Sean so wildly, so utterly.

Just one small gesture from him, and I would crumble all over again.