My Clingy CEO Husband

###Chapter 115: You Did Nothing Wrong

At Stellar Tech, the meeting drew to a close. The atmosphere was heavy, but everyone did their best to maintain a professional facade.

After assigning all the necessary tasks and ensuring her team’s morale had somewhat stabilized, Maxine Rhodes finally dismissed them.

She walked back alone, slowly, to the center of the office space where the confrontation had taken place.

She faced the massive floor-to-ceiling windows, gazing out at the thriving cityscape below, but her heart was a frozen wasteland.

The dull throb and burning heat on her cheek were still painfully distinct, accompanied by a faint ringing in her left ear.

Maxine Rhodes stood there for a long time, until a suit jacket carrying a familiar, crisp scent was gently draped over her slight shoulders from behind.

It was warm and dry, carrying his unique body heat and that reassuring scent.

Maxine Rhodes didn’t turn around. She knew it was him.

Ethan Hawthorne’s gaze instantly took in every subtle detail that was amiss. He reached out, gently brushing aside a lock of long hair that had fallen beside her cheek.

With the hair swept away, the red, swollen imprint of a hand was no longer hidden, laid bare before his eyes.

The mark was already beginning to turn purple, looking all the more jarring under the cold, white light of the office.

The color of Ethan Hawthorne’s eyes darkened visibly, a terrifying storm churning within them. The line of his jaw tensed.

After several seconds, he finally forced out two words, his voice low and hoarse, "It hurts?"

Maxine Rhodes still didn’t speak, only giving a slight shake of her head.

Ethan Hawthorne closed his eyes. When he opened them again, the storm in their depths had been forcibly suppressed. His heart ached for her.

"The air in here is suffocating," he said.

Maxine Rhodes looked up at him in the dim light.

"There’s a lookout on Mount Cinder where you can see the whole sunrise. I had Erza Sinclair make arrangements to have it cleared for the night."

"Go now?" Maxine Rhodes’s voice was a little hoarse.

"Yes," he said, standing and offering her his hand. "If you want to stay here, I’ll stay with you. If you want a change of scenery, we’ll go up the mountain."

Maxine Rhodes stared at his hand for a few seconds before placing her own on top of it.

He pulled her to her feet with a steady strength.

The car snaked its way up the mountain road. The windows were down, and the cold, late-autumn wind rushed in, a blast that was both sobering and numbing.

Ethan Hawthorne drove slowly, making occasional small talk. "This road was built in the seventies."

"There are a lot of curves ahead. Hold on."

The lookout was deserted. Only a few ground-level lamps cast a faint glow, while in the distance, the city lights resembled a scattered river of stars, brilliant yet remote.

Ethan Hawthorne took two thick woolen blankets from the trunk, along with a bottle of whiskey. He poured some into two tumblers and handed one to her.

Maxine Rhodes took the tumbler and downed it in one go. The fiery liquid burned a path to her stomach, chasing away the chill deep in her bones.

They sat side by side in silence for a long time.

The city’s clamor couldn’t reach this high; there was only the sound of the wind.

"When I was eight," Maxine Rhodes suddenly began, her voice soft, as if she were telling someone else’s story.

"I got two yuan as a reward for getting perfect scores on my final exams. I used it to buy a blue butterfly hair clip. The next day, my brother broke it. I gave him a little push, and my mom ripped the clip from my hair and crushed it under her foot."

She paused, taking a large swallow of whiskey.

"The fragments were sharp. I secretly gathered them and kept them hidden for years. I only threw them away when we moved."

Ethan Hawthorne didn’t look at her. He just tipped his head back and took a drink of whiskey, his Adam’s apple bobbing as he swallowed.

"Throughout all three years of high school, I only had two decent jackets to alternate between. The soles of my winter shoes wore through, so I lined them with cardboard. On rainy days, my feet would get so cold they’d go numb."

She continued, her tone placid. "My deskmate asked why I always wore the same two jackets. I told her I just really liked them. She believed me."

"I paid for my first year of college tuition by peeling peaches at a cannery for two months over the summer. The peach fuzz irritated my fingers until they were red, swollen, and so itchy at night that I couldn’t sleep."

She swirled the whiskey in her tumbler. "Later, they started telling everyone they had to sell everything they owned just to put me through college."

The night wind lifted her hair, revealing the bruise on her left cheek, which had now deepened to a dark crimson.

"Ethan... you know? The hardest part isn’t that they never loved me."

She looked up, a bottomless pain in her eyes. "It’s that they loved me once."

"Before my brother was born... The winter I was three, I came down with a high fever."

"I was so feverish I became delirious. The village’s barefoot doctor said I probably wouldn’t make it."

"My mom... Susan Miller... she held me at the local clinic and cried all night, refusing to let me go. She told me later that she prayed, begging to trade ten years of her own life to save mine."

Maxine Rhodes’s lips twisted into a smile that was more painful than a grimace. "It’s a cliché, isn’t it? But I remember it. I remember her holding me, how she smelled of hospital disinfectant and her own sweat. I remember the feel of her tears landing on my burning forehead. I remember... she did love me once."

"At least she did then. Back when she didn’t have any other choice."

Ethan Hawthorne said nothing, just listened quietly.

"On my fourth birthday," Maxine Rhodes continued, her eyes on the distant, brightening sky, but her gaze unfocused, "my dad... Felix Rhodes... carved me a little sword out of wood. It was crude, the edges weren’t even sanded down, but I treasured it. I even slept with it. He said, ’My girl, I’ll teach you swordsmanship when you’re older. Then no one will dare bully you.’"

She paused, her voice growing thicker. "Later, Hugo Rhodes snatched the sword to play with and broke it. Felix Rhodes just said, ’It’s all right, your brother’s still little. Dad will carve you a better one next time.’"

"But there was never a next time."

"After Hugo Rhodes was born, everything changed."

Her tone turned icy again. "The best food went to him. The new clothes went to him. The smiles went to him. My existence went from ’daughter’ to ’older sister,’ and then to... a tool. A tool that was supposed to be sensible, to always give in to her younger brother, to support the family."

"They gave me just a little taste of sweetness, let me know what it was like, and then personally snatched it away and told me I didn’t deserve it."

"If they had never loved me at all, I might have given up hope long ago."

Tears finally streamed down her face—not in a torrent, but quietly, one drop after another, scalding hot as they landed on the back of her hand. "But they *had* given it to me. Just a little bit, right when I was at the age I needed and craved love the most. And then, just when I thought it was my whole world, they suddenly took it all away and handed it to someone else."

"Do you understand that feeling?" she asked, her voice trembling. "It’s not the pain of never having something; it’s the pain of having it, then losing it. You remember the warmth of an embrace, the security of a promise... and then you’re forced to watch as all of it is stripped away, piece by piece, and given to someone else who is unconditionally adored simply because of his gender."

"You start to doubt yourself."

"Did I do something wrong? Am I not good enough? Is it because I’m a girl that their love was just temporary? Conditional? That it could be taken back at any time?"

Ethan Hawthorne reached out and took her icy hand in his. His palm was searingly hot.

"You did nothing wrong," he said, every word resolute.