Chapter 1
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Chapter 1
Every night, Charlotte Bennett dreamed that her devoted husband, Giovanni Castillo, was cheating on her.
The first time, she dreamed she was miscarrying while Giovanni whisked another woman away on a ski trip to Switzerland. When she woke in a panic and confronted him, he calmly produced attendance records from a seminar-nearly a thousand people there could confirm he’d been present.
The second time, she dreamed that when her mother died, he took that same woman to an auction and donated the only jewel her mother had left behind. Yet in the waking world, he simply printed out his call logs and cleared his name with a gentle smile.
The third time, she dreamed she and the woman were both kidnapped, and he didn’t hesitate to save his mistress. Because of his choice, Charlotte plunged off a cliff and shattered her right arm. But once again, he simply handed her a medical report proving her arm was perfectly healthy.
After countless confrontations over these nightmares, Charlotte lay tucked in Giovanni’s arms and asked, “Gio, will you ever love someone else?”
He kissed her as he vowed, “Never. You’re the only one I’ll ever love. If I ever break that promise, I shall lose you forever,”
And Charlotte believed him.
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That was, until Valentine’s Day, when she received an intimate photo of Giovanni and her best friend, Elvira Keller.
The same husband who had been watching fireworks with her just half an hour ago was now screwing her bestie.
She headed straight to Giovanni’s company to demand an explanation.
But the moment she reached his office door, the conversation between him and his friends inside stopped her cold.
“Gio, we’ve got Elvi’s birthday party all set,” one of them said. “But aren’t you worried Charlotte’s going to remember about you and Elvi? Or figure something out?”
Giovanni sounded completely at ease. “Impossible. I hired the best hypnotist in the world. Erased memories won’t come back. As long as you all keep your mouths shut, she’ll never know.”
Someone let out a laugh. “Charlotte is such an idiot. She actually thinks all those lingering memories are just bad dreams. You have no idea how hard it is not to laugh when I see her playing coy with you.”
“Exactly. It’s normal for guys to step out. It’s totally standard for a successful man like Gio to have two girls.”
“Too bad Charlotte is too jealous to accept it. Otherwise, Gio wouldn’t have had to drop a fortune erasing her memory. And we wouldn’t have to put on this ridiculous act every single day.”
Giovanni’s expression suddenly hardened, his voice turning ice-cold. “Shut up. I’m hiding this from her for the rest of her life, and none of you are breathing a word of it. Only Lottie is fit to be my wife.”
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Chapter 1
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Charlotte shoved him away, putting hard, physical space between them. “Nothing.”
Just as Giovanni was about to speak, his phone buzzed.
He checked the screen and immediately looked away. “Lottie, something just came up at work. I’ve gotta handle it,” he said, shifting awkwardly. “Get some rest. I’ll swing by later to keep you company.”
He braced himself for the usual argument, but the normally clingy Charlotte just nodded. “I get it. Go.”
A flicker of unease gnawed at Giovanni.
But the phone kept buzzing, so he shoved the feeling aside and hurried out.
The second he was gone, Charlotte grabbed her phone and dialed her friend, Anthony Grant, a psychiatrist.
“Anthony? I think I’ve been hypnotized. I’m missing a huge chunk of my memory. Can you help me get it back?”
“I’m on my way,” he replied immediately. “Yes, I can undo it.”
An hour and a half later, the memories came flooding back.
Charlotte dissolved in tears.
It turned out Giovanni had been cheating on her all along. The nightmares she’d been having were all real.
She remembered the screaming matches, the crying, the total breakdown right before she had finally asked for a divorce. And yet,
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the very next day after she handed him the papers, someone had wiped her memory clean.
Since then, Giovanni had started playing the role of the loving
husband.
Everyone around her had been part of the sick charade, feeding her nothing but lies.
Charlotte buried her face in her knees, cold sweat breaking out across
her skin as the truth sank in.
Her wound had reopened and started to bleed, but the crushing betrayal hurt far worse.
She didn’t lift her head until Anthony finally left the ward.
Her eyes were bloodshot and brimming with tears. Her nails had dug deep crescents into her palms.
She pulled up an old email containing a job offer she had once turned down, then typed a short reply. “Hi. I would like to accept the position at the Royal College of Art.”
The response came almost instantly.
“We are thrilled you’ve changed your mind. We’ll process your paperwork right away.
“We expect you to officially start in two weeks.”
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