"How are you feeling, Miss Elara?" Antonio asked, his eyes full of pity and sympathy for her as he looked at the woman lying on the bed with a pale face.
His heart trembled, his fists clenching by his side when she didn’t answer.
Trained to be a man who had no place for emotions in his heart because of his job from when he turned eighteen, for the first time, Antonio found it hard to control his anger.
The anger for her ex-husband, the anger at her for letting them harm her to that level and more importantly for hiding such important things, the anger at her brother for not ever checking up on his sister, and the anger at her family for leaving their child alone all were piling up in his heart.
After what felt like an eternity, Elara opened her eyes.
"How do you think I am feeling, Antonio?" Elara looked at her bodyguard sheepishly, her slight smile faltering when she took in his expression.
Realization dawned upon her. The doctor probably ran his mouth loose.
She exhaled sharply, wincing at the pain that travelled through her shoulders to her spine.
"What did the doctor say?" she asked, her eyes serious now.
Antonio walked closer to her.
"What really happened? I heard it all, but I want to hear it from you, Miss Elara. If you tell me, I promise I’ll keep my mouth shut before the boss, but I need to know the truth first," Antonio said.
Elara sighed. Her fists clenched by her side as her gaze hardened when she thought about that night.
"That night when I decided to divorce Antonio, it wasn’t only because I felt betrayed and realized he would never love me and I was wasting my time, but because I lost something precious to me, something very close to my heart, my baby," Elara said, tears welling in her eyes.
Antonio swallowed hard.
"Did he know? Your ex-husband?" He asked, barely keeping his voice calm.
Elara shook her head.
"No. I got the reports that day itself. He came home drunk a couple of months ago, and that’s when that happened. I thought he finally was falling for me and the alcohol brought out his deepest desires, but how wrong I was..." Elara chuckled humorlessly, tears falling from her eyes and rolling down her cheeks.
"I thought that one-night stand with my own husband and that baby would make him love us," Elara continued as she started laughing harder, tearing at her own words and pathetic choices.
Antonio hesitated. But when he saw her almost breaking down, he couldn’t help himself and stepped forward to hug her.
Elara placed her forehead on his chest while he patted her head like a brother, shielding her from the world’s eyes.
"That day, my horse, Orion, was going haywire when he saw me, not because he wanted to greet his owner but because he could feel my pain and could smell me bleed," Elara said, tearing up even more when she remembered how intense that horse’s eyes had been.
The more she thought about how she pathetically hoped for things that would never happen, never be hers, ignoring what she already had, the more guilty she felt.
Antonio stayed quiet.
He let her bawl her eyes out, knowing all too well that she needed to let go of that pain that she was probably keeping hidden in her heart; the fact that she couldn’t share it with her own brother and family was proof of that.
After some time, Elara wiped her eyes and looked at Antonio with resolution.
"I didn’t tell my family about it because I don’t want them to pity me. I used to own a gang, Antonio. This is something not even my family knows about me," Elara said, her gaze intense, an indication of the trust she was putting in him.
"I can’t return there. I would’ve if it had been earlier, but this reopening of the wound worsened it. I’ll have to build everything from scratch. And while my parents would be more than happy to let me live happily and without worry for the rest of my life, what about my self-respect?" Elara asked, her eyes appearing even clearer now.
Antonio looked into her eyes for a few seconds before nodding.
"It’s Andrew Lloyd, right?" He asked out of nowhere.
Elara wanted to ask how he would know, but after everything that happened, it wasn’t hard to connect the dots either.
"Don’t mess with him. I don’t want to have anything to do with them." Elara looked away, and Antonio wanted to say he wanted to teach that man a lesson, but one look at her pained expression stopped him.
"Miss Elara, I promise I won’t let anyone harm you ever again," Antonio said, and Elara smiled.
She shook her head at him.
"Some things are not in your control, Antonio. It’s my fight. I shall finish it," she whispered.
She was about to ask him to promise to keep it a secret for her, but before she could open her mouth, the door opened, and to her surprise, the person who entered was the last she had expected to arrive.
"What are you doing here?" Elara asked as Andrew stood at the entrance.
"How could I not come? You are my wife. I know you are angry about those rumors from that night, but that was a lie," Andrew said.
He looked at her observantly before his brows furrowed.
"Were you crying? Why? What happened?" He asked.
Elara’s heart squeezed against her chest. So many times in the past, she had prayed to God that he would look at her at least once and ask her what happened.
And now that it was happening, she finally felt no hope in that man at all.
Antonio, who had wanted to punch the man so badly, barely controlled his anger, all for Elara’s sake, when he saw Andrew.
"She needs rest. You need to go out," Antonio said.
Andrew looked at the bodyguard with an uneasy expression. He did not like this man at all, who had been appearing everywhere with her.
What did she even need a bodyguard for? Protection from whom? She was influential as long as she was his wife, and now that she was pretending not to be, what status did she really hold?
Andrew wondered before scoffing.
"The only person who needs to get out of this room is you. Who allowed you to speak between husband and wife?" Andrew asked.
Antonio seethed at the man’s words.
"Husband and wife? Where were you when—?"
"Antonio!" Elara raised her voice to remind him, and the man shook his head to let her know he wasn’t planning to talk about that, making her sigh in relief.
Andrew, who thought she was siding with him, smiled victoriously.
He knew it. The woman who claimed to love him with everything wouldn’t let any random bodyguard humiliate him like that.
"Elara, I know you are temporarily angry. Let’s take it home. It’s been a long time since you returned. I miss your cooking," Andrew tried to add a warm remark, hoping that would make the woman before him smile and agree with him.
Elara scoffed inwardly.
She didn’t scoff at the man but at herself. Because she knew if it had been the Elara from earlier, she would’ve jumped in rejoice and immediately agreed to go with him, even cooking a healthy and tasty meal for him, despite her pain.
She would’ve really done that.
And now that she looked back at herself, rather than feeling pathetic like she was feeling earlier, she felt sad for the woman she was when she was in love.
Rather than arguing with him over how she was wounded and how he had no regard for her, Elara forced a smile on her face.
"Where is Beatrice staying?" She asked.
Andrew froze at that question for a second before clearing his throat.
"She is living in the guest room of our house, but I told you it’s because she was wounded and—" Andrew paused when he remembered what Elara had said when she pushed him off, even when bleeding.
Elara’s smile widened.
"You call me your wife but allow a female friend to stay in the house, the one you were in love with and wanted to marry in my absence, and you hope for me to understand the situation and not take it wrongly. Am I correct?" She asked.
Andrew felt tongue-tied. He opened his mouth a couple of times to explain but didn’t know what to say, really.
Antonio felt Elara’s emotions change, and remembering the doctor’s advice to give her proper rest and not to distress her, he walked to Andrew.
"Mr. Lloyd, you should go out. My madam will meet you when she is alright," Antonio said, and without waiting for the man’s reply, he practically pushed him out of the room before closing the door.
"Are you alright?" He turned to Elara, and when she nodded, Antonio sighed and fished out his phone to order something to eat.
Outside the door, Andrew looked at it with mixed emotions.
He saw a doctor approaching the ward and walked to him.
"Sir, what happened to Elara?" He asked.
"Are you her husband?" The doctor asked.
Andrew was about to nod but then stopped.
Elara might not like it when she is so angry.
"A relative," he said.
"Her gunshot wound opened up because of the fall. We have stitched it up, but let’s see how it turns out after recovery," the doctor said.
Andrew stood frozen on the spot when he heard his words.
Gunshot wound?