"I thought things would get better when I grew up," she said, her voice hollow. "I thought no one could bully me anymore. But the boys... they grew up too. They started getting ideas, and they ganged up on me, tried to rape me. I fought back, I ran, but they just kept dragging me back."


    Her breath hitched. "They ripped my clothes to shreds. That day... if I hadn''t had a knife on me, if I hadn''t cut one of them, I... Even if they had raped me, I wouldn''t have killed myself. No, I would have killed them first. Then I would have killed Jason and burned that entire orphanage to the ground."


    Her voice dropped to a venomous whisper. "And Jason was no better! He tried to have his way with me too. I had to save myself, again and again, just to escape and build the normal life I have now."


    "I can''t sleep soundly, not even for one night. I have to keep a pair of scissors or a knife under my pillow just to close my eyes."


    She had saved herself time and time again, fighting her way out of the darkness, only for him to drag her right back into the abyss.


    Lionel''s fists clenched at his sides, his eyes zing with a mixture of fury and agony. Every word from Hannah''s lips was a dagger twisting in his heart.


    After finally unleashing the darkness she''d held inside for over a decade, she felt a strange sense of release, yet the weight of it all refused to liftpletely.


    Hannah pulled her shirt back on, the tension slowly seeping from her coiled muscles as her oxygen-starved brain finally found relief. Seeing the shock in Lionel''s eyes, a cold, bitter smile touched her lips.


    "And what did you do? Don''t you dare tell me Sandra didn''t know about this. There are dozens of orphanages sponsored by you two, so why that one? Why did she insist you take me with you? Why did she have Cora drug my drink?"


    “Lionel, there are no coincidences in this world," she said, stepping toward him until she could press a finger against his chest, right over his heart. "You funded the very ce that tried to destroy me. You helped the warden who tried to rape me. And you had the audacity to think I was the ungrateful one."


    Her voice cracked with scorn. "Why couldn''t you find out what Sandra did? Because you didn''t just stop loving me you despised me! That''s why you never bothered to look into anything that concerned me."


    Lionel grabbed her hand. "No, that''s not it! I funded the orphanage because I


    remembered you grew up in one, and I thought..."


    "You thought what? That you were


    thinking of me?" Hannah yanked her


    hand free, a self-mockingugh


    escaping her lips. "If you were really thinking of me why didn''t you bother to find out which orphanage came from before you threw money at it? Why did you just blindly fand whichever one Sandra pointed to?"


    "There''s no point in making any more excuses, Lionel. I hate you," she said, her voice chillingly calm. "I have never hated you more than I do right now."


    Not even after the countless times he''d abandoned her for Sandra had she felt a hatred this profound. But now... she was done. The disappointment was absolute.


    Like a marite with its strings cut, Hannah''s arms fell limp at her sides. Her face a nk mask, she walked out of the study.


    Cora, who had been eavesdropping outside, jumped back in surprise as the door swung open. Her first instinct was to flee, but seeing Hannah''s lifeless expression, she realized she didn''t need to.


    She had heard everything.


    Cora despised Hannah, but she''d never imagined her past was so horrifying, or that Sandra could be so cruel Suddenly she remembered the photo she''d taken at the dessert shop. Maybe this was her chance to make things right.


    Finding the picture in her phone''s gallery, Cora hesitated for a long moment before knocking on the study door.