Chapter 744
“It wasn’t purely coincidental. Yvette picked you as her scapegoat from the start. Yvette had a crush on Zachary, but you were his girlfriend at the time. So, choosing you as the scapegoat seemed like the perfect plan for her,” Jonathan ́explained.
Rosalie’s hair stood on her back.
It turned out that Yvette’s idea was to kill two birds with one stone!
She didn’t happen to be a scapegoat by chance. She had been deliberately chosen. to shoulder the blame from the very outset of this conspiracy.
Rosalie closed her eyes and digested the truth.
Much of the truth was harsh, but perhaps an even harsher reality lay in wait for her ahead.
Her eyelashes fluttered, and her hands clenched the thin quilt covering her. After a prolonged silence, she opened her eyes, gazed at Jonathan again, and asked, “When you reopened the case back then, you were actually hoping I wouldn’t uncover the truth, weren’t you? So, you found Mike, leading me to believe that was the whole truth.”
Jonathan’s body quivered slightly, and he slowly walked toward Rosalie.
Every time he took a step closer, her fingers clenched the sheet tighter. Finally, he stood by the bed and knelt down in front of her. “I’m sorry. At that time, I believed that this was the best way to bring closure to the case.
He had never thought that he would apologize so many times.
However, in recent days, he had uttered numerous apologies before her, both when she was awake and when she was asleep.
“Why did you lie to me?” She drew a deep breath and raised her voice unconsciously. “You could have chosen not to share the truth and refrain from investigating the case. But why did you lie to me? Why did you lead me to believe that Mike was the true perpetrator? Why did you seek to protect Yvette?”
Every question she asked felt like the sharpest of blades, piercing his chest and inflicting excruciating pain.
“I’m sorry… I’m sorry…” Jonathan lifted his chin slightly and offered a humble, heartfelt apology. “I was afraid that you’d leave me once you knew the truth, but I was equally afraid you’d persist in investigating. Lwanted to bring you justice and restore your innocence. That’s all I could do!”
Rosalie smiled bitterly and felt her nose go sour. “Is this the way you love someone? Do you love me in this deceitful way?”
“Rosie, please forgive me. I would put Yvette in jail, put the Hamilton family through a lawful trial, and I… I can also go to jail and endure the suffering you’ve
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gone through…” His voice choked.
At this moment, he was no longer the formidable Jonathan of Strico, but a poor man begging for her forgiveness.
“Forgive him…” Rosalie thought as she looked at Jonathan blankly. He knelt in front of her with pain and regret on his face, but she didn’t know how to bring herself to forgive him. The truth came too late for her.
It came too late as she had suffered so much. It came too late, as she had placed her unwavering trust in the fabricated truth he provided her.
But now, she realized that he knew her pain all along. She couldn’t help but ponder what her fate might have been if they had never crossed paths after her release from prison, and if he had never fallen in love with her.
Rosalie’s silence prompted Jonathan to hastily reach for her hand. His hands were cold and trembling. As he clasped her hand, it felt as if he were grasping a piece of driftwood in the midst of a turbulent sea.
No matter what, he wouldn’t release his grip on her. Once he let go, he would drown.
“Rosie, didn’t you promise to forgive me, no matter the wrongs I’ve committed? You said if I cried, you’d forgive me. Can I cry then? I’ll cry for as long as you want, shed as many tears as necessary. Please forgive me,” he implored, tears flowing from his eyes, tracing down his handsome face.
Rosalie felt as though something heavy was constricting her heart.
She never thought that one day she would see him crying under such circumstances.
Tears continued to stream down his cheeks, falling onto her and his hands, each drop feeling like a searing ember.
She found herself reaching out to his face with the hand that wasn’t held by him. As her fingers brushed against his tear-moistened skin, a long-lost wave of nausea suddenly surged within her.
Rosalie abruptly covered her mouth, pushed Jonathan away, and rushed into the bathroom. She leaned over the sink, retching violently.
She hadn’t experienced such intense vomiting since her pregnancy. But today, it felt as if she wanted to expel every last bit from her stomach.
“Rosie!” Seeing Rosalie vomit like this, Jonathan became instantly alarmed. Subconsciously, he raised his hand to comfortingly stroke her back, attempting to aid her in breathing and alleviate her discomfort.
But when his hand touched her back, she vomited even more intensely.
“Don’t… Don’t touch me…” Rosalie finally caught her breath. She raised her hand and pushed Jonathan away.
As soon as his hand was no longer in contact with her, her vomiting gradually
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subsided.
Rosalie lifted her pale face, wiped her mouth, and cast a gaze at Jonathan. In her eyes, a glint of irony flickered, directed both at him and herself.
Her lips slowly parted. He appeared to have suddenly grasped something as his expression suddenly turned ugly.
“Don’t say… Don’t say it!” He screamed inwardly, but what reached his ears was her forlorn smile. “Even if I tell you I forgive you, my body… It seems it cannot forgive you. Tell me… What should I do? What should I do?”
Anytime he made contact with her, it triggered her nausea and vomiting. Despite her efforts to suppress the sensation, her body appeared to instinctively provoke this reaction, and there was no way to control it.
Jonathan staggered. At that moment, his face was full of despair.
The doctor came over in the middle of the night and examined Rosalie. Finally, he concluded that this should be a form of instinctive bodily resistance, and there was no specific medication that could be employed. It was akin to how a person’s body instinctively protects itself when confronted with danger.
Hearing the doctor’s conclusion, Rosalie smiled bitterly.
Could it be that her body had endured too much during her time in prison? Perhaps those inhumane torments had left an indelible mark, causing her body to
react with such resistance to Jonathan’s touch after she learned the truth.
