Testing Love, Proving Power Chapter 2

After changing out of my work uniform, I went home and started packing.

Not my things. Ethan’s.

The apartment was a gift from my mother. Even if I was returning to my father’s world, this place would always be my sanctuary.

Ethan didn’t come home that night.

The next morning, just as I was about to call and tell him to pick up his stuff, there was a knock on the door. A group of people I didn’t know walked in, looking around the apartment assessingly.

“Hi, I’m from the real estate agency. I’m here to show the apartment to some clients.”

I frowned. “An agency? A showing? I’m not selling my apartment. Who sent you?”

The agent looked just as confused. “A Mr. Ethan Hayes. He said he was in a hurry to sell and that we could list it at a low price to get it off the market quickly.”

It was absurd.

He had faked poverty and debt to bleed me dry of my savings. He’d made me sell my most prized possession to pay his fabricated debts. And now, this monster was trying to sell the only thing my mother had left me. He was trying to take even more from me.

I kicked the agent and his clients out. Before I could even call Ethan, he showed up, looking frantic.

“Olivia, why did you send the agent away? If we don’t sell the apartment, how are you going to pay back the three hundred thousand? Don’t tell me you’re actually going to sell yourself?”

I was the one who had been deceived, played, and left with nothing.

But he was the one acting desperate.

And he had the audacity to stand there, on his moral high ground, and accuse me of something I hadn’t even done.

A thousand tiny needles of pain pierced my heart.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath.

“Ethan, you’re even after the apartment my mother left me. Haven’t you had enough fun yet?”

“We’re breaking up.”

His expression froze. For a moment, he looked genuinely panicked, but then, as if remembering something, his face twisted into a sarcastic sneer.

“So, when the going gets tough, the tough get going. Olivia, I really misjudged you. It turns out you’ve been looking down on me this whole time. You said you’d never leave me, but now you’re walking out when I’m at my lowest. Are you really that obsessed with money?”

I had said I’d never leave him. I had said I wouldn’t care if he had nothing.

But those promises were based on the belief that he was working hard for our future.

Not that he would use my promises as a get-out-of-jail-free card to play with my heart and feed his twisted ego.

I wiped my tears and retreated to the bedroom.

No matter how loudly he yelled for an explanation, I didn’t come out.

Finally, I heard the heavy slam of the front door. A moment later, my phone rang.

It was the bar manager. She said there was a problem with my resignation and asked me to come in.

“Olivia, I’m in a tough spot here. Some customers are saying you promised to sell them drinks last night. Now that you’ve quit, they’re causing a huge scene because you’re not here.”

I remembered. In my anger, I had agreed to his friends’ disgusting proposition. I couldn’t believe they were still clinging to it.

This was between me and Ethan. I didn’t want to drag anyone else into it.

I hung up and rushed to the bar.

The manager looked frantic. “Olivia, the owner said that if you don’t go in there and sort out those customers, you’ll have to pay for the bar’s losses. And it’s a lot of money… I think he said three hundred thousand…”

Another three hundred thousand.

I frowned, a bad feeling creeping over me.

“Manager, what’s the owner’s last name?”

My sudden question seemed to throw her off. She looked at me, puzzled.

“Hayes,” she said, a hint of suspicion in her voice. “Don’t you know? Mr. Hayes was the one who arranged for you to work here in the first place.”