To the twilight hour, with an eerie and tense atmosphere, Vespera saw the man beside her had become a stranger, possessed by some demon.

“Can I know where we are going?” she asked cautiously.

“Ton’t know,” he replied. That made Vespera speechless.

Five minutes of suffocating silence passed before she spoke again. “You know, we don’t really have any deep hatred between each other. You made a mistake that many men would make, and I’m a… past-a-stubborn woman.”

“We had a beautiful love once. It just faded with time, that’s all. I don’t blame you, and you shouldn’t blame me either?”

Luke bimed to look at her. “You really are afraid of death, huh?”

Vespera gripped the seat belt tighter. What did he mean by that?

Was he raged because she insisted on the divorce! Was it that she had threatened to take him to court and expose the recordings of him and Tina, which sparked this murderous intent in him? Who could she call for help? How could she even ask for help? The first person that came to mind was not the police but Dominic, the man who seemed capable of anything. But why should he abandon come to her rescue?

Luke noticed her distraction and felt a surge of inexplicable anger. “Who are you thinking about?”

It was not just women who had such a sense; men had such instincts too.

Vespera glanced at him and replied, “I was wondering when you would stop the car. If you keep driving like this, won’t we run out of gas? How are we going back, then?”

She deliberately switched the conversation toward mundane matters. Luke, however, didn’t respond.

Vespera quietly reached into her bag. The phone Luke had taken was newly purchased, and she had kept important things on her old phone, so she hadn’t tried to get it back. She still had a backup phone in her pocket.

Instead of seeking Dominic’s help, she shared her location every five minutes to Rebecca, who was pinned to the top of her contact list. She also managed to send a message, though she wasn’t sure what kind of nonsense autocorrect might turn it into. The last time she had meant to send “help” to Raymond, she ended up sending “mwah” instead.

Rebecca was initially confused by the strange orchard location she received. However, after seeing a few disconnected words like “L North, Luke Brad Away,”

I was a garbled mess. But she caught onto it quite well; she understood that Vespera needed to be rescued. Without hesitation, she jumped into her car and sped off.

Thinking about it, Rebecca figured that Luke wouldn’t harm Vespera; he just wanted some time alone with her, so she never called the police.

The car drove out of the orchard and continued along a highway for another hour, passing through a suburban area and a small town. The further they went, the more remote the area became. Vespera had no idea where they were. She checked the time to see that it had passed 9:00 pm. She then realized they had been driving for almost three hours. At this point, all she could do was wait for his car to run out of gas.

The car finally did run out of gas, and they came to a halt at the foot of a desolate mountain. The warmth of spring had stirred the night alive with the calls of frogs and insects. The landscape beyond the window was pitch black, with only a few specks of light in the far distance. The lights were so far, they looked like scattered glimmers on a vast canvas. Could he really be planning to kill her?

“It’s just the two of us here.” Luke rolled down the window and lit a cigarette. The flickering orange glow illuminated his chiseled, handsome face. He took a drag from his cigarette while loosening his tie with another hand. His dark hair was then casually swept to the back, framing his face in a way that exuded a thuggish charm. In the eyes of other women, the current him was the embodiment of desire. He was handsome, wealthy, and effortlessly commanding. Even the simple act of loosening his tie was alluring.

Yet, the first time Vespera met him, he had been the opposite of what he was now. He was a fresh and sweet young man, and even holding hands would make him blush.

She missed that version of Luke, the one who seemed to have “died” long ago. Taking a deep breath, she decided to speak. “But what do you want?”

Luke pulled a swirled smoke as his gaze locked onto her. In the dim light of the surroundings, her face was still mesmerizing. Her slender figure was wrapped in a fitted murdered dress, and that delicate waist could be encircled with ease. A file of smoky breath hushed across her as he said, “I think the reason you’re so heartless towards me is because we’ve never had a child.”