Chapter 7: Chapter 7: The Unloved One Is the Third Party

When she stepped out of the hospital room, Vincent Reed was already squatting on the floor.

He looked like he was at his limit.

He’d gotten his head split open last night, lost a lot of blood, and thrown a fit. He had barely left the hospital before rushing back here, a mix of heartache and fury, and had kept watch for most of the night.

’Such a devoted man. The kind who would love her until death, without regret.’

’How had she never seen it before? How could she have been so foolish as to think she could make him fall in love with her?’

"How is she?" Vincent Reed shot to his feet the moment he saw her, running a hand through his hair.

"The cut on her wrist is very shallow. It seems her determination to die wasn’t that strong," Yvonne Sutton said.

"What kind of thing is that to say!" Vincent Reed frowned.

"I’m just stating a fact."

Vincent Reed glared at her and scoffed. "I agreed to marry you last night. You must be thrilled. I bet you got up bright and early, grabbed your ID and household registration, and rushed to the Civil Affairs Bureau, only to realize I wasn’t there. That’s why you’re so angry now, saying such nasty things."

Yvonne Sutton watched Vincent Reed in silence. ’He really is full of himself.’

"Let’s wait a bit. Once I’ve helped Wendy sort her things out, we can talk about us."

Yvonne Sutton let out a breath. "I told Wendy Winters that you proposed to me last night."

"What?" Vincent Reed’s brow furrowed. "Why would you tell her that? She needs me right now!"

"What? You were planning to marry me, yet you intended to hide it from her?"

"S-Still, I should have been the one to tell her!"

"Fine. Then you can be the one to explain it to her."

With that, Yvonne Sutton turned and walked away.

’One promises marriage, the other offers compensation.’

’Heh. Do they really take me for a fool?’

’Fine. I’d like to see just what dirty tricks they have up their sleeves!’

Yvonne Sutton spent the morning at the outpatient clinic. After seeing all her patients, she went to the cafeteria for lunch with Mina Adler.

"The news that Wendy Winters was admitted to our hospital last night for a suicide attempt got leaked online, but her PR team took care of it fast," Mina Adler whispered to Yvonne Sutton.

"Oh." ’Wendy Winters is the young miss of the Winters family, and with Vincent Reed helping her, of course they could suppress a little gossip.’

"So, everyone’s guessing that she really did have an affair with Stanley Lynch, and that she’s pregnant with his child."

"Oh."

"But then again, others are saying he’s the second son of Reed Tech. How could he possibly be willing to raise another man’s child? Tsk, tsk. Love makes you blind, though, so I think it’s possible."

After a lunchtime filled with gossip, Yvonne Sutton finally learned something new.

It seemed Stanley Lynch’s wife came from a powerful background—the kind Wendy Winters wouldn’t dare to cross.

Which meant Stanley Lynch couldn’t—and wouldn’t dare—divorce his wife for Wendy Winters.

In the afternoon, Yvonne Sutton went to the inpatient ward.

During her rounds, she stopped by the VIP room. Vincent Reed was silently peeling an apple with his head lowered, while Wendy Winters lay in bed, looking weak and listless, as if she were gravely ill.

"Yvonne, you’re here." Wendy Winters greeted her in a soft voice as she entered.

Yvonne Sutton walked to the bedside and asked if she was feeling uncomfortable anywhere.

"I feel a tightness in my chest."

Yvonne Sutton listened with her stethoscope. Her heartbeat was perfectly normal.

"I’ll schedule an ECG for you."

"Okay."

Yvonne Sutton nodded, but as she was about to leave, Wendy Winters called out to stop her.

"Yvonne, Vincent and I grew up together. I always thought I just saw him as a childhood friend, but these past few days I’ve finally seen what’s in my heart. I’m actually in love with him."

Yvonne Sutton found this amusing. ’Vincent Reed is sitting right there, and she’s using me to confess her love to him.’

’Well, what do you expect from an actress? She loves the drama.’

She simply thrust her hands into her pockets and watched Wendy Winters’s performance.

"I’ve wronged him for so many years, and I want to make it up to him. Our wedding will go on as planned, and this time, I truly, sincerely want to marry him."

Yvonne Sutton tilted her head and glanced at Vincent Reed. He was still looking down, peeling the apple.

"Mr. Reed, you’re not deaf, are you? Aren’t you going to react?"

Vincent Reed looked up and shot her a glare.

Yvonne Sutton shrugged and turned back to Wendy Winters. "And then what?"

Wendy Winters pulled a check from under her pillow, glanced at Yvonne Sutton, and then pushed it in front of her.

"Vincent doesn’t love you. You should be clear on that. In fact, between the two of us, you’re more like the third wheel. But you have been with Vincent for eight years, after all. Consider this one million our compensation to you."

Yvonne Sutton’s gaze fell upon the check, her eyes darkening.

’So after all this time, I’m the third wheel?’

’I sold eight years of my life, only to get a million in return?’

"Not enough?" Vincent Reed finally spoke.

Yvonne Sutton looked up at him and saw the same arrogant, superior expression on his face as was on Wendy Winters’s.

"Not enough," she said.

Vincent Reed nodded and took a card out of his wallet. "There’s another five million in here. That should be enough, right?" 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝒆𝔀𝒆𝙗𝓷𝒐𝙫𝒆𝙡.𝒄𝓸𝓶

"Not enough," she repeated.

"Heh. Yvonne Sutton, you don’t really think you’re worth that much, do you?"

Yvonne Sutton bent over and picked up the check and the black card.

She stared at the two items and laughed silently for a long moment.

Finally, she tossed the card back, keeping only the check.

"This one million isn’t compensation. You’re paying me back."

She looked at Vincent Reed. "In our second year together, you fought with your family and ran away from home. You said you wanted to start your own company to prove everyone who looked down on you wrong. But you needed start-up capital, and you didn’t have any money. So I sold the house my parents left me and scraped together one million for you."

Yvonne Sutton held up the check. "As for the interest on this one million... consider it a tip for all your hard work servicing me in bed."

Vincent Reed’s face instantly darkened. "Yvonne Sutton!"

"But my love is priceless, Vincent Reed. You can’t afford it now, and you’ll never be able to afford it in the future."

She walked out of the room with the check in hand, only to see a man in a hat standing by the door, holding up his phone.

Her brow furrowed. When the man saw her, he turned and fled.

"Hey! What are you doing?"

A nurse shouted after the man.

By the time Yvonne Sutton got out, she only saw the man’s retreating figure. She figured he was probably a paparazzo, snooping for celebrity gossip.

But she didn’t think much of the little incident. She wasn’t a celebrity, after all.

Back in her office, Yvonne Sutton excitedly called a real estate agent she knew.

"Ms. Hughes, I want to buy back the house my parents left me. Could you please ask the current owner if they’re willing to sell? I can pay above market price."

"The house has been vacant this whole time, so it’s not much use to the owner. They might be willing to sell. Hold on, I’ll ask for you right away."

This house was the one her parents had left her. She had sold it, gritting her teeth, because she couldn’t bear to see Vincent Reed so dejected and lost back then.

Ever since then, she had been saving up money, hoping to buy it back.

She could have asked Vincent Reed for the money, but she always felt that since she had given him that one million willingly, asking for it back might give him the wrong idea.

And even though Vincent Reed knew perfectly well she had sold her parents’ house to raise that money for him, he never once offered to buy it back for her after his company took off.

While she was waiting anxiously, Mina Adler found her.

"Yvonne, you’re all over the internet!"

Yvonne Sutton froze for a second, then scrambled for her phone. To her disbelief, she was a trending topic.

She opened the trending topics page. At the very top was a video—the scene of her taking the check in Wendy Winters’s hospital room just moments ago...