The Love I Begged For Was Never Real novel Chapter 123

Late at night.

The city's neon lights blinked beyond the floor-to-ceiling windows, casting mottled shadows across the guest room carpet.

The living room lights were off, save for the motion-sensor light in the foyer that flickered on the moment the front door was pushed open, casting a dim, yellow glow.

Nora was sitting in the armchair by the window, holding a foreign catalog on jewelry appraisal. Hearing the door open, she didn't even lift her eyelids, keeping her gaze locked on the pages.

Gideon took off his coat, which carried the chill of the night air, handed it to the approaching butler, and strode on long legs straight toward Nora by the window.

There was obvious exhaustion etched between his brows. His usually immaculate suit jacket was slightly wrinkled at the edges, and his tie had been loosened—proof of the immense energy he had expended calming down an emotionally unstable girl.

“Giselle needed two stitches on her leg.”

Gideon broke the silence in the room, his voice low and hoarse, laced with the fatigue of his midnight rush.

Nora offered no response whatsoever.

“I know you're upset.”

Gideon's eyes dropped to the fresh, pink skin on Nora's neck, his tone carrying a rare hint of explanation.

“She's my sister. She was traumatized when she was little at the orphanage.”

Gideon looked down, a trace of helpless justification in his voice. “I watched her grow up. When she's hurt and terrified, I can't just ignore her.”

Nora slowly closed the catalog and set it on the low table beside her.

She turned her head, meeting Gideon's gaze.

“I understand.”

She didn't care about his explanations in the slightest.

In his heart, Giselle's tears would always be a hundred times more important than his own wife's dignity. He 'couldn't ignore' Giselle, which meant it was perfectly justified for him to ignore and abandon Nora whenever he pleased.

She would keep that evidence safe. She had plenty of patience.

“Go do whatever you need to do,”

Nora withdrew her gaze, returning her eyes to the book in her hands. Her voice was flat, devoid of any fluctuation. “I'm going to sleep.”

Gideon stared at her impenetrable wall of indifference, his brows twisting into a hard knot.

He had lowered his pride to come and explain himself, yet she refused to offer him even a single extra word of acknowledgement.

He had assumed she would be angry, that she would feel wronged. He had even mentally prepared himself to patiently comfort her. But instead, she shut him out entirely with this absolute, freezing detachment.

The sensation of punching a wall of cotton filled him with a sudden, inexplicable irritation.

Gideon stood up. He looked at Nora's downward-cast eyelashes, which never fluttered up to look at him again, and ultimately left without saying another word.

Over the next few weeks, the days dragged on in a suffocating loop.