His Crush Provoked Me; I Left, He Refused

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My absurd marriage to Emmet Henson began with me taking advantage of him when he was vulnerable, and it was sustained by Jasmine Pruitt's every provocation.

I thought I was the one holding the script, the one in control of everything.

Until that night, when I finally grew tired of this endless tug-of-war and decided to separate.

Only, at the door of the study, I overheard him say to his weeping childhood sweetheart, in a chillingly cold tone:

"One last time. Jasmine, go provoke her one more time. I want her... to never be able to leave me."

The next second, the door swung open, and he saw me standing in the doorway, looking like I'd been struck by lightning.

The motion-sensor light in the entryway flicked on, dispelling the darkness in the room.

Emmet was back.

He carried the chill of the late-night air, along with a scent I knew all too wellJasmine's favorite "Forest Rose" perfume. Sweet, cloying, and full of blatant provocation.

I sat on the living room sofa with the lights off, only the tablet in front of me giving off a faint glow.

On the screen, the bold black headline of the entertainment news was brazen and glaring: Henson Group President Emmet Henson Spends the Night with Childhood Sweetheart Jasmine PruittIs a Wedding Near?

The accompanying photo was a blurry candid shot from a paparazzo. In a revolving restaurant, by the floor-to-ceiling window, Emmet was looking down, wiping the corner of Jasmine's mouth with a tissue.

The angle had been caught perfectly; his profile was sharp, his expression focused, while Jasmine looked up, her eyes shining with adoration and reliance.

A golden couple, made for each other.

In the comments, their shipper fans were already celebrating:

Ahhh, the real couple is giving us sweetness! I always said true love wins!

Where's that Winfield heiress who bought her way to the top? Why doesn't she hurry up and get lost and make way for our Jasmine?

Three years. She stuck with him from a nobody to being worth billionsour Jasmine deserves it! Emmet Henson, you'd better not do her wrong!

I scrolled through the comments expressionlessly, then switched off the tablet.

The "vicious female second lead who bought her way to the top" they were talking about was, at that moment, rising from the shadows in a burgundy silk nightgown, barefoot, stepping onto the cold wool carpet, walking step by step toward the man countless people enviedthe man I had tied down with a single contract.

Hearing the movement, Emmet looked up.

He wore a dark gray cashmere coat today, which made his frame look even taller and leaner. Perhaps because he'd run into someone he didn't want to see, his eyes, usually as clear and cold as an old well, were now visibly tinged with weariness and impatience.

"Still up?" he said, his voice deep as ever, like snow steeped in a winter night.

I said nothing, only walked up to him and, quite naturally, raised my hand to unbutton his coat.

The cool, crisp scent of cedar and white tea that belonged to me instantly and forcefully wrapped around him, scattering the sweet rose fragrance that didn't belong here.

Emmet's body stiffened for a moment, his Adam's apple bobbing almost imperceptibly. He lowered his eyes, watching my slender fingers move across his chest, his gaze dark and unreadable.

"I saw the news." I unhurriedly helped him out of his coat and draped it over my arm, then looked up at him, my tone as calm as if I were discussing some trivial report. "Nicely shot, plenty of mood. Anyone who didn't know better would think you'd already married someone new, Mr. Henson."

"It was just a business function," he explained, his tone flat and even, like a machine without feeling.

"Oh? Does a business function with your childhood sweetheart require booking out an entire restaurant, and wiping her mouth with your own hand?"

I gave a soft laugh, my fingertip lightly pressing over his heart through his expensive white shirt. "Emmet, don't forget whose name this company goes by now."

His gaze darkenedthe cold of someone whose sore spot had been struck.

"Dora," he said my name in warning.

"I'm here." I tipped my head up and gave him a bright, wicked smile. "Mr. Henson, you know my rules. Jasmine provokes me once, and I have to take it back from you twice over."

This was the twisted balance between us.

I had forced him to marry me, bound him to my side, and vented my unrequited love by tormenting him.

And he punished me with coldness, distance, and his eternally unchanging "devotion" to Jasmine.

He had to do as I said.

Because I held over forty percent of Henson's shares, making me the company's largest shareholder. His pride, his career, his lifelineall of it was in my hands.

So whenever Jasmine stirred up trouble out there, whether by putting out press releases to jab at me, or, like tonight, deliberately manufacturing a scandal to disgust me, I never went and traded words with her.

Beneath me.

I would simply wait for Emmet to come home, and then, in my own way, make him "pay the price."

For instance, having him cancel an endorsement Jasmine had her eye on, or handing the path he'd paved for Jasmine straight over to Jasmine's worst rival.

Every time, his face would go ashen with rage, fury churning in his eyes, and yet he'd have no choice but to swallow it, and, humiliated, do exactly as I said.

I loved watching him look like he wanted to kill me but couldn't. It gave me a sick sense of satisfaction. As if only this way could I confirm that this man I loved to the point of madness was firmly under my heel.

The air froze in that moment.

I looked into his suppressed eyes, and the smile on my lips deepened.

"What? Not happy about it?" I rose onto my toes and leaned in close to his ear, my breath warm and suggestive. "Mr. Henson, want your childhood sweetheart to lose that lead role in the new film by tomorrow?"

His breathing turned suddenly heavier.

Those eyes, always coated in frost, now rippled like a deep pool with a stone thrown in, spreading out circle after circle of dark, unreadable waves.

After a long while, he closed his eyes, and when he opened them again, every emotion had been reined in, leaving only a dead, still calm.

"What do you want?" he asked, his voice hoarse with suppressed feeling.

"Nothing in particular." I took a step back, tossed his coat carelessly onto the sofa, then turned and headed for the study on the second floor. "Come with me."

Emmet's study was my favorite place in this villa.

Like the man himself, it was calm, restrained, meticulous. The walls were lined with books, from finance to philosophy, from architecture to art, showcasing the owner's deep learning and remarkable taste.

I walked behind the wide mahogany desk, pulled out the leather chair, and sat down without ceremony.

This was his throne. And I was brazenly, openly occupying it as my own.

Emmet followed me in and stood on the other side of the desk, his tall figure casting an oppressive shadow under the overhead light. He didn't speak, only looked at me in silence, as though watching a child throwing a tantrum.

I ignored his gaze and went on toying with an ornament on the desk.

It was an old Lamy fountain pen, made in Deston, with a matte black body worn smooth and shiny from years of use.

This pen was the beginning of my love for him.

Seven years ago, I was an unknown student in the design department, while Emmet Henson was already a rising star in the architectural world, specially invited by our school as a visiting professor to give a public lecture. That day the auditorium was packed, and because I was late, I could only squeeze into a corner of the back row.

Sunlight streamed through the tall floor-to-ceiling windows, casting dappled light and shadow across him. Dressed in a simple white shirt, he stood on the stage, explaining Le Corbusier's theory of light and shadow in a clear, resonant voice. He didn't use slides; he simply held that fountain pen and sketched freely on the projection screen. With just a few strokes, the relationship between light, shadow, and space came alive on the surface.

In that moment, all I could see was that man glowing in the drifting dust of light, so refined that even his knuckles looked beautiful.

This, I suppose, is what it means for your heart to skip a beat.

Later, as an intern, I found every way I could to squeeze into the firm he had just founded. I made him countless cups of coffee and organized countless files for him, but he never once remembered my name.

Until one day, a colleague plagiarized my design and then turned it around on me. Everyone was pointing fingers at me, and I hid alone on the rooftop, crying my heart out. Then he appeared and handed me a handkerchief.

"The design is good," he said, his voice cool yet like a ray of light, "but it isn't mature enough. Go back and revise it, and hand it to me tomorrow morning."

The next day, I was cleared of the plagiarism suspicion. It was he who personally pulled up the computer records and cleared my name. From that day on, the seed in my heart grew wildly.

I thought I had at least left some small mark on his heart.

But later, when the Henson Group fell into crisis, when Jasmine had fled far away and he was frantic over funding, I mustered all my courage and took my entire fortune to him, wanting to help him through the crisis.

He shattered all my foolish delusions with a single line: "Miss Winfield, there's no need for an outsider to trouble herself."

So it turned out he had forgotten long ago. In that instant, boundless love intertwined with immense resentment and humiliation, and finally gave rise to a mad idea.

It's fine if you don't remember me. I will make you unable to forget me for the rest of your life.

So I appeared before him again, no longer as an admirer, but as a capitalist, carrying the Winfield family's investment contract and a marriage agreement.

This time, he did not refuse.

Pulling my thoughts away from the surging memories, I looked at the cold fountain pen at my fingertips, and a dense, prickling pain rose in my chest.

I looked up at Emmet Henson across from me.

"Mr. Henson," I said, setting the pen back in its place and shifting into a cold, businesslike tone, "there's a charity auction tomorrow for that plot of land in the South End. I want you to go."

He frowned slightly. "For that kind of occasion, sending the vice president is enough."

"No." I refused flatly. "You have to go in person. And I want you to win the oil painting called Waiting."

Waiting was the work of one of Jasmine's favorite up-and-coming painters, and she had voiced her love for it on several public occasions.

Emmet Henson's face darkened instantly, cold enough to drip water.

"Dora, don't push it too far."

"Too far?" I laughed. "Compared to the news I saw tonight, what is this? I'm only asking you to buy a painting. Or is it that you're afraid your childhood sweetheart will be unhappy if you buy the painting I told you to?"

I stood up, walked over to him, and reached out to straighten his slightly wrinkled collar.

The gesture was gentle, but the words that came out were like knives.

"Emmet Henson, don't forget who turned you from a firm owner who could barely land a project into the powerful Mr. Henson you are today."

"It was me, Dora."

"So put away your pitiful devotion. In front of me, you have no right to it."

The charity auction in the South End had always been a grand event for Ashford City's elite circles.

When I walked into the venue on Emmet Henson's arm, nearly every gaze stuck to us. Some were dazzled, some searching, but most were gleefully waiting for a show.

After all, last night's news about Emmet Henson and Jasmine had blown up, and today he was appearing together with me, the "official wife." Who wouldn't want a close-up view of this love-triangle drama?

I wore a custom-made silver fishtail gown, its hem studded with fine, scattered diamonds that glittered brilliantly under the crystal chandeliers, dazzling beyond compare.

And beside me, Emmet Henson, in a sharply tailored black suit, with his handsome face and cool bearing, looked like a nobleman stepped out of a medieval castle.

Standing together, in appearance alone, we were flawless.

"Look, isn't that Dora Winfield? She can actually still smileshe's got nerve."

"Shh... keep your voice down. Look at Mr. Henson's face, cold as ice. He was obviously dragged here."

The whispers buzzed like irritating flies. But I acted as though I hadn't heard a thing, my smile only growing more polished and proper.

Emmet Henson noticed my stiffness, glanced down at me, and his deep eyes held a complicated mix of emotions.

Suddenly he tightened his arm, drawing my body closer against his.

"Ignore them," he murmured against my ear, his warm breath brushing my earlobe, sending a faint shiver through me.

I froze for a moment and looked at him in surprise. This was the first time he had ever shown any protectiveness toward me in public.

Was he afraid I'd blow up on the spot and leave him with no way to save face?

I tugged at the corner of my mouth, about to say something, when a sweet, simpering voice drifted over from not far away.

"Emmet, Dora, you're here too?"

It was Jasmine. Today she wore a pure white gauze dress, her long hair draped over her shoulders, her makeup light and clear, the very picture of an innocent, otherworldly white lotus.

She walked up to us intimately, her gaze fixed on Emmet Henson, full of grievance and longing, as if I were the third party who had come between them.

"Emmet, I'm so sorry about last night. I caused you and Dora so much trouble. It's all those reporters writing nonsense..." As she spoke, her eyes reddened.

What a movetwisting black into white and striking first. I sneered inwardly, but kept my face composed.

Emmet Henson glanced at her, his brow furrowing almost imperceptibly, his tone very flat. "It's fine."

That answer seemed to embolden Jasmine even more.

She turned to me, an innocent, apologetic smile on her face. "Dora, you're not angry with me, are you? Emmet and I grew up together, like real siblings..."

"Of course not." I cut her off, my smile even gentler and more gracious than hers. "We're family. Why fuss over every little thing? But you, Jasmineyou'd do well to be more careful going forward. Don't let some unnecessary misunderstanding hurt your career, or the Henson stock price. Wouldn't you agree?"

My words left no opening. Jasmine's smile stiffened for a moment. She looked to Emmet for help, but he only kept his eyes lowered, toying with the sapphire cufflink at his sleeve, as if the war in front of him had nothing to do with him.

The auction started soon after.

When the host brought out the oil painting titled Waiting, Jasmine eagerly raised her paddle.

"Six hundred thousand." Her voice was sweet and coy, and she even turned to glance our way, the provocation plain to see.

I didn't move. I only turned my head toward Emmet beside me and said, in a voice only the two of us could hear, "Raise your paddle."

Emmet didn't move. His jaw was tight, clearly a silent protest.

The smile on my lips faded a little. My hand slid down from the crook of his arm and gently covered the back of the hand resting on his knee.

"Emmet," my voice was soft, but carried a command that brooked no argument, "do you want me to call right now and pull the plug on the show Jasmine's starring in?"

His hand tightened in an instant, his knuckles going white.

I could feel the anger he was holding down and the fierce struggle beneath his palm.

A full ten-odd seconds passed, and just as the host was about to bring down the gavel, he finally, slowly, raised the paddle in his hand.

"One million."

His voice was cold as ice.

The whole room broke into an uproar. No one had expected Emmet to step in himself and bid against his own "first love."

The color drained from Jasmine's face in an instant. She stared at Emmet in disbelief, her eyes full of shock and hurt.

"Emmet, you"

Watching her teeter on the edge like that, my mood inexplicably lifted.

I wanted everyone to see it. Your first love is worth nothing to me. As long as I want it, he can throw a fortune away on youand for my sake, he can just as easily leave you utterly humiliated.

The mood of the auction turned delicate because of the shift on our side.

Jasmine clearly wasn't going to let it go. She bit her lip, her eyes rimmed red, and raised her paddle again. "One million one hundred thousand."

I didn't even have to speak. I simply tapped the back of Emmet's hand twice with my fingertips, lightly, in rhythm.

Emmet closed his eyes, as if resigning himself to fate, and raised the paddle again.

"Two million."

This time he didn't even bother to glance at Jasmine. He just stared, expressionless, at the painting on the stage, as if it weren't a work of art but an enemy of his.

The murmuring in the room grew louder. This was no longer a simple bidding warit was a blatant slap in the face. With his own hands, Emmet was grinding Jasmine's face into the ground.

In the end, Jasmine set down her paddle in defeat, her beautiful eyes brimming with tears as she glared at me, that stare as if she wanted to swallow me alive. I met her gaze calmly, and threw in a winner's smile for good measure.

Waiting sold to Emmet for two million dollars.

After the auction, in fine spirits, I took Emmet's arm and swept out through a crowd of complicated stares.

Back in the car, the man who had been so gentle and refined moments ago tore off the mask in an instant.

With a bang, he hurled the carefully wrapped painting onto the back seat.

"Dora, are you satisfied now?" He started the car, his voice thick with anger he couldn't hold down, the steering wheel groaning under his grip.

"It's fine, I guess." I gazed at the neon lights streaking backward past the window and answered lazily. "Two million was actually a little cheap."

"You!" He stomped on the brakes, the car screeching against the curb. Momentum threw me hard forward; thankfully the seatbelt held me.

"Do you really have to do this?" He turned his head, his eyes burning with two frightening flames in the dim car. "Humiliating her, humiliating me like thisis it fun for you?"

"Yes." I met his gaze without backing down. "Very fun. Seeing that face on Jasmine, wanting to cry but not daring to. Seeing you like this, wanting to blow up but not daring to. I couldn't be happier."

That's how vicious I am. I want to jab him with the sharpest thornsand jab myself too. We torment each other, hurt each other, sinking and rotting together in this loveless marriage.

"Dora," he looked at me, his eyes churning with emotions I couldn't read, thick with anger, disappointment, and a trace of pain?

After a long while, he suddenly went slack like a deflated ball, all the menace draining out of him.

He started the car again and said wearily, "What is it going to take for you to let me go, and to let yourself go too?"

His words stabbed hard at my heart.

Yes. What exactly did I want?

I forced him to marry me, tied him to my side, and used tormenting him to vent a love I could never have.

But in these three years, had I gotten even a sliver of happiness? No. Every victory was like drinking poison to quench a thirst. After the brief rush of pleasure came a deeper emptiness and despair.

Looking at my own pale, twisted face reflected in the car window, I suddenly felt tired. So very tired.

When I got home, I didn't go looking to give him grief the way I usually did. Instead I went straight to my bedroom and locked the door behind me.

My phone buzzed twicea WhatsApp message from my best friend, Olive.

Holy crap! Dora, you were an absolute badass today! That scumbag Emmet dropped two million on you, and that snake Jasmine was green in the face! So satisfying!

But seriously, aren't you tired? Watching you go head to head with a schemer like that every single day wears me out just looking at it.

Reading Olive's words, my eyes went hot without warning.

Was I tired? Of course I was tired.

I typed back: Olive, I think I can't keep this up anymore.

After sending that message, I tossed my phone aside, buried my face in the pillow, and the tears I'd held down for so long finally came pouring out. Maybe it had been a mistake from the very start. Love you force into being comes to nothing in the end. Rather than burning myself out in this endless tug-of-war, better to just let go.

The next day, for the first time ever, I didn't go in to the company. I called my private attorney and had him draft a divorce agreement. The division of assets was simple: I wanted nothing. Everything I had brought to Henson back then, I would return to him untouched.

All I wanted was my freedom.

Old Mr. Henson's seventieth birthday celebration was a grand affair, drawing a huge crowd of guests, livelier even than the auction earlier that day.

When I arrived, Emmet still hadn't come.

Alone, I fielded all the relatives who came over to make small talk, a proper, fake smile on my face, while inside I counted down the minutes until I could leave.

"Oh, Dora, you're here? Where's Emmet?" It was Emmet's Aunt Sylvia, forever known for her gossip. "Why did he let you come alone again? That boy has no sense at all."

"Something urgent came up at his company. He'll be here later," I answered with a smile.

"Well, men have to put their careers first," Aunt Sylvia said, though her eyes drifted toward Jasmine, who stood not far off, surrounded by a cluster of socialites and fawned over like a star. "Not like some people, who have nothing to do all day but hang around a man."

I followed her gaze. Jasmine was wearing a pink strapless gown today, sweet and pretty. She seemed to have recovered from yesterday's setback, chatting and laughing with the people around her, though her eyes kept slipping, as if by accident, toward the door.

She was waiting for Emmet.

I looked away, not caring to watch anymore. This farce was no longer my concern.

I made an excuse and walked off alone to get some air outside the study in the back garden. The evening breeze was cool, clearing away the stuffy air of perfume and food in the banquet hall.

I leaned against a pillar in the corridor, took out my phone, and opened the divorce agreement my attorney had just sent.

The moment I signed, the absurd mess of the past three years between Emmet and me would finally be over.

I took a deep breath and was about to reply to my attorney, to ask him to bring over the hard copy.

Just then, from the study not far away, I heard Emmet's voice.

He was here.

Instinctively I put my phone away, wanting to leave this place before trouble found me.

Before I could take a single step, I heard his voice, cold as if it had been steeped in ice.

"The thing I told you to handleyou botched it."

That was not the tone anyone used with an elder.

Something turned over inside me, and as if some force were guiding me, I slipped into the shadow of the pillar.

Right after, I heard Jasmine's tearful, wounded voice.

"Emmet... I really didn't know Dora would..."

"The script I gave you wasn't for you to go head-to-head with him at the auction."

There wasn't a trace of tenderness in Emmet's voice, only a cold question thrown out in a single line.

My mind went blank, a buzzing rush of nothing.

"Your job was to needle her, make her jealous, make her take all her anger out on menot to go humiliate yourself."

A script? A job? What were they talking about?

"But... but you knew I liked that painting..." Jasmine was still sobbing.

"Liked it?" Emmet let out a low, soft laugh, thick with open contempt.

"Jasmine, have you forgotten what you are? You're just an actress I hired. Play your part well and take your money. Any ideas you shouldn't be having, you'd best get rid of now."

In that instant, all the blood in my body seemed to freeze.

Jasmine... he'd hired her? All those provocations, those scandals, all those sparks that made me lose control again and again... none of it was real? All of it... was staged by him?

Why? Why would he do this?

A terrifying thought, one I didn't dare dwell on, rose to the surface of my mind.

Just as the sheer shock left me unable to move, I heard Emmet's phone ring.

He answered, his tone a little gentler than before, but still carrying that cold, everything-under-control edge.

"Attorney Lambert, it's me."

Attorney Lambert... was my personal attorney!

My heart seized.

When I made out what Emmet and Attorney Lambert were saying, I felt as if I'd been plunged into an ice pit.

I could hear my own heart hammering, like a drum, pounding against my eardrums.

I couldn't hold back the flood of fury any longer. I burst out from the shadows and slapped him hard across the face.

The crisp crack of the slap tore through the dead silence. I was shaking all over, every word bleeding out of me: "Emmet Henson, you make me sick!"

The usual restrained, self-controlled look on Emmet's face was gone, replaced by something I had never seen before, something intensely predatory.

He was like a beast that had lain in wait for a long time, finally dropping every disguise, baring its sharp fangs.

Step by step he closed in on me, pinning me between the cold pillar and his chest, with nowhere left to go.

"Dora, you can't get away." He lowered his head, his scorching breath spilling across my cheek, his voice low and hoarse, yet carrying a hint of a triumphant smile.