Chapter 170


    Chapter 170


    If it had been three months earlier, maybe Leanne would have been thrilled by those


    words.


    But now, that phrase which once kept her up at night, trapped within an invisible had


    cage,


    be something she shied away from.


    “I really don’t know. I can’t figure you out, never could,” Leanne said. “You say you love me, but it


    doesn’t feel like love to me.”


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    “I don’t love you? Then why did I go to all the trouble to convince you to go to Northwood, learning how


    to cook for you, serving you hand and foot like you’re royalty? What am I, a domestic god in the


    making, or just a bored rich kid ying at being a servant?


    I panicked when I couldn’t reach you for a few hours, dropping everything at work toe find you?


    ElitePinnacle was just taking off, gunning for its first major IPO project, and it all fell apart because I


    walked out.


    When Derek White took you into that club room, I was so frantic I kicked down the door. I waited


    outside your ce for half an hour, just to see when Jeremy would leave?


    If I didn’t love you, would I leave a thriving career at Stake toe back here and start over?”


    Curtis looked into her eyes, “Leanne, you can hate me, but don’t doubt my love for you.”


    He could mention anything else, and Leanne could remain cool and detached, but when he brought up


    those six months in Northwood, there was still something that stirred


    inside her.


    Those days drenched in sweetness, so profoundly happy, they were likely to be unforgettable for a


    lifetime.


    Leanne was silent for a while before she spoke, “I once believed in your love. But it turned. out to be


    the biggest mistake of my life, and I paid a hefty price for it.”


    “How could it be a mistake? I practicallyid my heart bare for you, and you can’t feel it at all?” Curtis’


    voice was hoarse, “Leanne, how can your heart be so cold?”


    Leanne exhaled slowly, easing the disrupted nerve back into ce, striving to stay clear-headed.


    “Don’t you get it? Whether or not you truly love me, what your rtionship with Suzan is, it doesn’t


    matter to me anymore.”


    “I’m done begging for your love.” She said it so calmly, so clearly, that Curtis was filled with a helpless


    feeling.


    She was like a handful of running water, impossible to hold onto.


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    The nearly sub-zero temperatures on the mountaintop were bone-chilling, the wind so fierce it seemed


    to cut through his entire being every vein cold.


    After a long pause, he asked again, “What about you?”


    He knelt on one knee, half-squatting in front of Leanne, his eyes locked onto hers, “I crave your love.


    Do you love me?”


    Leanne found she still couldn’t remainpletely unaffected; her heart skipped a beat at the question.


    She wasn’t sure if her expression gave anything away, she hoped not.


    She remained silent, the Misty Mountain holding its eternal, distant hush as golden light


    cascaded over the sea of clouds.


    And all he got was silence – the one response Curtis dreaded the most.


    Voices approached from afar, and before anyone was in sight, Joy’s shouts could be heard,


    “Skyler, you better not be lying! If she’s not up here, I’m tying you and your girlfriend together and


    tossing you down into the ravine!


    Curtis had sent a message to Skyler earlier, giving him a heads-up, but in Joy’s eyes, he was just as


    bad as Curtis, none of them any good.


    Hearing this, Leanne got up from the rock to meet them.


    The whistling wind cried through the mountains, but Curtis called out to her, “Leanne.”


    He turned, watching her retreating figure with a gaze that was murky and forlorn, yet still not giving up,


    his raspy voice doggedly asking, “In these three years, wasn’t there even a moment when you loved


    me?”


    Her steps hesitated for just half a second, her reply devoid of any hesitation, “No.”