The Love I Begged For Was Never Real novel Chapter 211

Sixteen. Alleyway. Saving someone.

Ten years ago.

That gloomy afternoon with the same torrential rain—those memories suddenly shattered like a broken mirror, countless sharp fragments piercing his brain in that very second.

He vaguely recalled that on that day years ago, Giselle had stayed out playing, refusing to come home, and her phone had died. He went to the school gates to pick her up but waited for ages in vain.

Gideon had searched high and low across all her usual haunts by himself, coming up empty-handed, the panic threatening to swallow his sanity whole.

As he passed a dimly lit alleyway, the desperate cries of a girl pleading for help and the sleazy laughter of a few street thugs drifted from deep within.

Under the faint glow of the streetlamp, Gideon saw a group of shady thugs backing a girl in a school uniform into a corner. The girl kept her head down, arms crossed tightly over her chest, trembling violently in terror.

At that time, Gideon's mind was utterly consumed with the terrifying thought of Giselle being bullied.

Convinced that Giselle was trapped inside, he didn't hesitate for a second. He snatched up a rusted, discarded steel pipe from the side of the road and charged in recklessly, radiating a murderous rage.

His attacks were brutal and lethal, practically beating the switchblade-wielding punks bloody until they fled in terror.

His own arm and shoulder had been slashed by sharp shards of glass, blood dripping from his fingertips.

Yet, when he finished handling the trouble and turned around with the bloody pipe in hand, ready to pull a terrified Giselle into his arms.

He finally got a clear look at the face of the girl huddled in the muddy puddle, shivering uncontrollably.

It was the face of a total stranger.

It was just a stranger he didn't recognize, wearing a standard school uniform.

Not Giselle.

All that remained in Gideon's heart was the disappointment of saving the wrong person, replaced by an even heavier dose of anxiety.

He had never imagined that this seven-year moth-to-a-flame devotion—a pursuit that drained all her youth and dignity—had all stemmed from a simple misunderstanding a decade ago.

Had she really chased him for so long just because of that insignificant little incident?

Gideon's heart seized violently, an intense wave of bitterness surging up from the very depths of his chest.

Looking at his deathly pale wife lying under the covers, he realized for the first time that his coldness was a blade that drew no blood but wounded just the same.

The guilt welling up inside almost knocked him off his feet.

Before tonight, he had always viewed Nora's persistent clinginess as an irritating nuisance.

But now, every single one of those so-called nuisances transformed into the heaviest of slaps, striking him ruthlessly across the face.

To him, those events were ancient history. Amidst the power struggles within The Hayes Group, he had long wiped that rainy night's interlude clean from his memory.