The Love I Begged For Was Never Real novel Chapter 53

Nora was forced to look up and meet his gaze. The sharp pain from her wrist and the dull ache in her back intertwined, making her instinctively shudder.

This man, whom she had loved for ten years, was now humiliating her with the most vicious assumptions.

He didn't care about the judgmental glares she had endured at the gala tonight, or how embarrassing it was for her to stand in the corner.

He only saw her exchanging a few words with Julian, and immediately assumed she had damaged the Hayes family's pride, assuming she was using such cheap tactics to get his attention.

The sharp pain in her wrist continued to spread. A layer of moisture gathered in Nora's eyes, but she bit her lower lip hard, refusing to let the tears fall.

Looking at the handsome yet furious face before her, she felt an overwhelming sense of absurdity.

What was he so angry about? Was it because she had talked to another man? Or because Julian's sarcastic remarks had bruised his ego as the head of the Hayes family?

Whatever the reason, it definitely wasn't jealousy, and it certainly wasn't love.

Nora lowered her eyes, biting her lip until she tasted the metallic tang of blood, forcibly suppressing the wave of grievance and anger rising in her chest.

She looked up, meeting those dark eyes burning with rage, and the emotions she had repressed for so long finally erupted.

"Married?"

Nora let out a low laugh, the sound dripping with thick self-deprecation. "Gideon, have you ever even considered me your wife?"

During these long ten years, he had let Giselle walk all over her, let the people in their circle treat her as a laughingstock, and left her to sit alone on stormy nights.

He had never once thought of her as his lawfully wedded wife.

And now, simply because she stood next to another man, simply because he felt his territory was being challenged, he threw around this title to declare his dominance.

"I didn't sign it. I don't agree."

That divorce agreement sitting on the table at the villa had long been locked in the deepest drawer of his desk.

As long as he didn't nod, Nora would be a Hayes in life and in death.

"You were the one who shamelessly begged to marry into this family. Nora, you know perfectly well how long you begged my grandfather just to get through that door. Now you want to leave just like that? What do you think the Hayes family is? A hotel where you can check in and out as you please?"

"Why shouldn't you agree? Didn't you think I was just an outsider? Didn't you think I was an eyesore?"

He didn't agree. What right did he have to not agree?

He gave all his love to Giselle and saved all his coldness and humiliation for her. Now that she was willingly stepping aside, he was acting like the offended party.