Chapter 184

Alexander’s eyes were bloodshot. The burning cigarette had already seared his palm, but he didn’t even flinch. He finally figured it out—that faint sense of distance he always felt from Vivian, that tiny thing he could never quite put a finger on. She loved someone who was gone. And that someone… wasn’t him. He was just… a stand-in. The way she looked at him, all gentle and patient—it wasn’t really for him. It was because he reminded her of the man she’d lost. The guy in the photo frame. No wonder that even at their engagement party, when she didn’t recognize he was the same boy she’d saved six years ago, she still approached him first. To her, he’d become a kind of emotional anchor. A replacement. Her insomnia had started to improve. She really saw him as that man… the one who had died. There was a storm inside Alexander, but his eyes looked eerily calm. Of course, this was all still just his suspicion. He needed to dig deeper, find out the truth. Eventually, he forced himself to snap