He Knelt and Asked Me to Give My Heart to His Student Chapter 10
Before dawn, he boarded a flight to San Francisco.
On my second morning living there, I opened my apartment door and found someone sitting on the hallway floor.
It startled me at first. Then I looked closer and realized it was Adrian.
The moment he saw me, his eyes lit up. His voice was rough and hoarse.
“Natalie, I can’t quite let you go.”
I told him calmly. “It’s normal to feel thrown off right now. Give it some time. You’ll get over it.”
He shook his head, and his eyes suddenly reddened.
“No. That’s not it. I love you. You’re the one I’ve always loved.”
“We were together for eleven years. There’s no way you’ve let that go so easily either.”
“Please, just give me one more chance. I can resign from Columbia. I swear I’ll cut Chloe off completely.”
Looking at him, I suddenly laughed.
“But we were together too long. There wasn’t any excitement left.”
He choked on his breath at once, and a tear slid from the corner of his eye. “I’m sorry.”
I lowered my eyes, feeling nothing at all.
“You really have wronged me.”
“If you have any decency left, stay the hell away from me. Don’t show up in front of me just to disgust me.”
I turned and stepped into the elevator.
It was my first day at a new company, and I had no time to waste on Adrian.
Whatever feelings I’d once had for him had been worn away long ago, ground down by one disappointment after
another.
Life in San Francisco was so busy.
After that, I rarely heard anything about Adrian.
I only learned by chance from a friend that he had handed in his resignation to Columbia and was now focused entirely
on running Carlisle Holdings.
I never imagined I’d see Chloe again either.
She was waiting downstairs outside my office building, so weak she could barely stay on her feet.
She told me Adrian had abandoned her, and now that her condition was acting up and she had no money for treatment,
she had nowhere left to turn but me.
For a second, I honestly thought I had misheard her.
“You’re asking me for money?”
“You want money from the woman whose marriage you helped wreck?”
Her face was pale, but her tone was full of righteous certainty. “If you hadn’t insisted on divorcing him, he wouldn’t have thrown me away just to win you back. He wouldn’t have left me to suffer on my own.”
“I should’ve had the best treatment, the best chance at a new heart. Now I can’t even afford basic medication. How is
that not your fault?”
I looked at the stubborn set of her face and shook my head.
The moment you pinned all your hopes on him, you should’ve known this day might come.”
“You brought this on yourself.”
She clenched her teeth and glared at me.
“If you hadn’t been born a few years before me, I’d be the one he loved. I’d be his only wife.”
“I’m going to make you disappear from this world!”
She pulled a knife from her pocket and lunged straight at me.
I dodged, grabbed her wrist, and twisted the knife neatly out of her hand.
In the condition she was in, hurting someone would have been hard enough, let alone killing anyone.
She broke down sobbing, then blacked out almost immediately when she couldn’t catch her breath.
I looked at her coldly, then turned and walked away.
Someone passing by called an ambulance for her.
I never found out whether she was saved.
Even if she was, she probably didn’t have long left.
In the third year after Adrian and I split up, I started a new relationship.
I met him through work. He was half English and half Italian, gentlemanly and funny.
We did all kinds of things I had never experienced before.
We went bungee jumping and skydiving. We bought two last-minute tickets to Iceland in the middle of the night just to
see the northern lights.
I was so happy with him that, later on, I barely thought about the past at all.
We had a simple wedding.
He promised me, with complete sincerity, that he would love only me for the rest of his life.
A lifetime is too long. All I want is to live well in the present.
Then, at some gala years later, someone softly called my name.
“Natalie.”
I stood there in a daze for a long moment before I remembered.
It was my ex-husband from New York City.
Doing the math, it had already been almost six years.
I greeted him politely.
Just before I left, he suddenly asked, “Now… do you have-”
“Natalie!”
I looked up. It was Julian Moretti.
He was standing a short distance away with our daughter’s hand in his.
I couldn’t help smiling. I turned back and gave Adrian a brief farewell.
“I’m sorry. My husband and daughter are looking for me.”
He stood there, motionless, for a very long time.
I wouldn’t know, though, because I never turned back.
Julian lifted our daughter into one arm, then laced his other hand through mine and smiled. I’m here to take you
home.”
Our daughter blinked up at me and pouted sweetly. “Mom, I missed you so much! Grandma let Daddy bring me to see
you.”
Lily Moretti was the daughter Julian and I adopted together.
We loved her dearly.
I pinched her chubby little cheek.
“I missed you too. sweetheart.”
It was spring in San Francisco, and it felt wonderfully warm.