CHAPTER 174: CHAPTER 174- I’M BACK NOW

"Charles, I’m back now. We won’t be apart again," Janice pleaded, her voice trembling. "Let me spend a lifetime making it up to you—and to Trista. Please..."

Tears the size of pearls slipped from her eyes, landing softly on the back of his hand. The heat of her sorrow scalded his skin, tugging at every corner of his restraint.

Her tears had always been his undoing.

No matter how calm and rational he tried to be, Charles realized he still had no defense against her. In this chase called love, he had always been the one who lost—again and again, bleeding from wounds too deep to see.

With a sharp breath, he pulled his hand away.

He forced himself not to cave, not to be that same man who would so easily forgive her. Love, no matter how deep, needed boundaries. Everything else—her temper, her stubbornness, even her blindness—he could accept. But not this.

Not the fact that she left him behind.

She’d imposed her decisions on him time and again, deciding alone what was best for them. So what if she couldn’t see? He never cared about that. But she had also left behind their newborn daughter.

Even if he could understand her reasons, that didn’t mean he could forgive her actions.

If she truly loved him, she should’ve stayed—fought with him, cried with him, endured with him.

Running away had never been the answer.

That was the one thing he could not forgive.

"Charles..." Janice called his name, her voice breaking as she looked at his back. He didn’t turn around, and in his eyes now, there was no tenderness—only distance, like the man who once searched the world for her was gone.

They were standing in the same place once more, yet somehow, their hearts had never felt further apart.

"Let go," he said coldly—so coldly it chilled her to the bone.

He had never looked at her like that before.

Her hands dropped from his arm as if burned. Without another glance, Charles strode away, leaving her standing there alone.

Just then, the switch of the fountain behind them clicked on. Jets of water erupted around her in cascading waves, spraying outward in graceful arcs. Janice flinched as cold droplets soaked through her clothes, chilling her skin.

Cold...

She wiped at her face, but she couldn’t tell if it was water or tears. The coldness of her body was nothing compared to the frost in her heart.

Wrapping her arms around herself, she slowly sank to the ground. The doctor had told her not to cry—it wasn’t good for her eyes yet. But watching him walk away so cruelly, she couldn’t stop the sobs from rising in her throat.

She didn’t know how long she had sat there.

When Janice finally moved, her legs had gone numb, her vision blurry, and Charles was long gone. She stood up shakily, surrounded by unfamiliar hedges and stone paths.

Then her gaze lifted—and she froze.

Before her was a fountain, its design an exact replica of the one in front of Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris. The very place where she had once made her silent wish beside the sacred waters.

This... was his gift to her.

A fairytale kingdom built with his own hands.

Only now, the prince no longer needed his princess.

Janice walked out of the estate in a miserable state, her steps slow and heavy.

Charles was leaning against the car, arms crossed, the very picture of impatience. Amos was nowhere to be seen. She tilted her small face up toward him as she approached, her soaked clothes still clinging to her slender frame, long hair damp and limp on her shoulders, accentuating the sharp lines of her delicate face.

She looked thinner. Far thinner.

Charles quickly averted his gaze, but his chest ached, as if someone had driven a knife straight into his heart.

As soon as she stopped in front of him, he shrugged off his suit jacket and—without an ounce of tenderness—draped it over her shoulders.

The scent of his Dior cologne immediately enveloped her, sinking straight into her heart.

"Where’s Amos?" she asked carefully, sneaking a glance at his cold profile.

Charles opened the car door without replying, slid inside with his usual unapproachable elegance. Janice hastily followed, afraid he’d leave without her.

"He stayed behind to oversee the second inspection. We’re heading back first," he said flatly, eyes fixed on the road as he started the engine.

"Ah-choo!" Janice couldn’t help sneezing again. Her damp clothes were beginning to chill her to the bone. She clutched the suit jacket tighter around herself.

The car was warm, but Charles still shot her an annoyed glance.

Then, his voice came, like a blade wrapped in velvet. "When did you get back?"

Ignoring her presence was proving harder than he thought...

What he really wanted to ask was—where had she been this past year? Was she with Manfred?

Manfred had vanished from A City at the same time she had. Charles had suspected, dreaded... and hated. During her darkest days, when she had needed someone the most, the one by her side hadn’t been her husband—it had been another man.

"Yesterday..." Janice whispered. She had rushed back the moment she arrived in the country, unable to suppress the yearning to see him. But after hearing from Manfred how Charles had shut himself away, even neglected their daughter, she hadn’t known how to face him.

Everything she had done had been for him and Trista. But maybe... maybe he never needed her sacrifice in the first place.

"Did you come back with Manfred?" Charles’s voice dropped, low and tight with veiled fury—an invisible threat laced within.

"No. I came back alone," she answered quickly.

She had insisted Manfred return ahead of her, right after her final vision treatment. She knew Charles hated seeing them together. If it hadn’t been absolutely necessary, she would’ve never accepted Manfred’s help.

Her answer seemed to release some of the tension in Charles’s jaw.

"And where did you stay last night?"

He already knew she had come straight to Black Rock Co. to find him today. That thought gave him some bitter sense of satisfaction.

Still, if he didn’t teach her a lesson, she’d never understand the depth of his love—or the agony of her absence.

"...A hotel," Janice murmured, lowering her head like a child being scolded.

"I just... didn’t know if I could come home..."

Charles wanted to yell at her—If you’re back, then why not come home?

But in the end, he held back.

At least she was afraid. At least she still cared what he thought.

That meant there was still a part of her heart that belonged to him.

Even if he couldn’t be kind. Even if he couldn’t forgive her.

He still loved her.

The car sank into silence again. The air was heavy with unsaid words.

Then Janice spoke, her voice soft but desperate.

"Charles... can I go see Trista?"

She didn’t know if she had the right—not until he forgave her. But she missed her. Missed them both. And every step she had taken to reclaim her sight had been for that moment.

To look at them again with her own eyes.

Charles glanced at her shivering frame but said nothing. He simply pressed down on the gas pedal, the car accelerating as it left the city.

Toward the villa.

That silent consent was all the answer she needed.

A faint smile bloomed at the corners of Janice’s lips.

She had faith in herself.

But even more so... she had faith in him.