Chapter 971: Chapter 499: Side Story: An Unexpected Beginning and Ending 1_2

Also, from now on, both husband and wife must unconditionally trust each other, never again overthink or make wild guesses. If either side violates this, the other side will accept that party’s "cruel" punishment.

After reading the supplementary clauses of the agreement, Christine Quinn stood there for a long time, unable to come back to her senses.

The tears in Christine’s eyes had already dried; she stared at Skyler Jones in disbelief.

A bright, burning light rose in Oversky’s eyes. He cupped her hands in his and held them tightly. "I came to find you wanting to settle the score between us, but I realized that no matter how I tried, I couldn’t make it add up... So, forget the accounts. What you owe me, you can pay back with the rest of your life by giving yourself to me."

Christine’s eyes widened again; she stared at him in utter disbelief.

Faced with this sudden, complete reversal, she didn’t even have time to react!

What did he just say?

Did he mean that they were going to go on together?

"You..."

"Yes, I decided to cling to you a long time ago. Have you forgotten?"

She looked at him, sob after sob spilling out. She fixed her gaze on his handsome face and, in his eyes, found love and tenderness.

She loved him so much. If she truly lost him, how desperate and in how much pain would she be. She needed him so much...

"So you didn’t come today to sign the divorce papers with me, you came to..."

He chuckled softly, stroking her long hair. "I came to take you home, baby."

Christine stared blankly at Oversky’s handsome features, still unable to believe this sudden change in front of her.

Oversky gently pulled Christine into his arms and, with a big, warm hand, tenderly stroked her thin back. "Since it was a misunderstanding, we just need to clear it up... After everything we’ve gone through, in the days ahead, we’ll only treasure each other more."

Leaning against Oversky’s warm, solid chest, Christine didn’t want to let go at all...

Yet the inexplicable sour ache in her heart slowly made her push him away.

He was a bit surprised that she pushed him back and frowned as he looked at her.

Christine lowered her head, swallowed down the lump in her throat, then spoke to him in a solemn tone. "Oversky, have you really thought this through?"

"Christine..."

Oversky reached out, wanting to hold Christine, but she stepped back.

Christine widened the distance between herself and Oversky. Her reddened eyes looked at him sadly. "Are you sure you still want to keep walking this road with me?"

"Of course!"

"But we’re still going to run into so many, so many problems..."

"We can solve anything." Oversky promised.

"But Oversky, have you ever thought... that after we get back together, there actually won’t be many truly happy days? What we’ll feel most of the time is exhaustion."

Christine’s words made Oversky pause for a moment.

Christine turned her back to him, no longer facing Oversky, and spoke on her own. "Oversky... after you got back together with me, a lot of the feelings you had changed... Just like you told me before: I’m no longer pure, no longer kind. I’m deep, I scheme. I’m completely different from who I was at seventeen..."

Oversky sighed lightly. "Christine, I admit, you have changed a lot from when you were seventeen... But as the years pass, it’s not just you who’s changed. I have too. I shouldn’t have one‑sidedly blamed you for changing. Please forgive how immature I was back then... I’ve lived this long, and emotions have always been my weakest point."

Christine shook her head. "I know you very well... Actually, right from the beginning, when we first started getting along, you already realized that being with me wasn’t as happy as you had imagined. You traced it back to the root and finally realized that because time had passed, you and I had both undergone huge changes... Even though we still loved each other deeply, when we were together, we could no longer find that feeling from the past."

"Christine, my feelings for you haven’t changed..." Oversky confessed hoarsely.

"You haven’t changed... but you also have to admit that you don’t feel that much for the Christine Quinn standing in front of you now."

Christine’s words once again left Oversky stunned. 𝒻𝑟ℯℯ𝑤𝑒𝑏𝑛𝘰𝓋𝑒𝓁.𝒸𝑜𝘮

Christine slowly turned around to face Oversky’s grave face, and rasped out, "Oversky, let’s just let each other go..."

Oversky shook his head.

Christine spoke through the sourness in her chest, "Please don’t stay with me just out of responsibility anymore..."

Oversky’s expression grew darker and darker; his gaze on her was deep and shadowed.

Meeting his pitch‑black eyes, as deep as a pool, Christine spoke slowly. "Even though I misunderstood you about you and Jennifer Douglas, a woman’s intuition isn’t wrong... You’ve always hoped to find that old feeling from back then in me. But early on, when we first started being together, you already realized that the me standing in front of you is no longer that girl you liked back then, and that you could never get back that beautiful feeling from those days... But you’re a very responsible man. Whether it’s Marie, or all the suffering I went through for you over those years, you know very clearly that you owe me a responsibility. You can’t abandon me, because all the unhappiness in my life has come from you, and your family and friends won’t let you abandon me either."

"Why would you think like this?"

Oversky tried to walk toward Christine, but she had already stepped back, keeping her distance from him.

Christine kept shaking her head and retreating, until her body pressed up against the wall. "Oversky, I’m begging you, don’t give me pity, don’t pretend to deeply love the me I am now, and don’t pretend that you’re very happy being with me... I know you do all of this for my sake, but do you know that while I’m pretending to enjoy your pampering, I’m actually not living happily either..."

Oversky finally stopped moving forward. The heaviness in his expression revealed his present anxiety.

Christine stared blankly at Oversky, and spoke through the ache in her heart. "Go and look for your own happiness... Don’t waste any more time on me. I’ve never blamed you for the past, and I never asked you to take responsibility. Everything I did was something I was willing to do for you from the bottom of my heart. You truly don’t need to feel guilty toward me."

"From now on, we can face and solve all our problems together..." Oversky’s voice was hoarse.

He had admitted it... He had finally admitted it.

That the love and tenderness he gave her was, in truth, more out of responsibility.

In this life, there was no way he could ever treat her badly. He was that kind of devoted, loyal man.

Her heart hurt as if it were being sliced open by a knife...

Christine was almost choked speechless, but she still faced him with the strongest posture she could muster. "If we were really capable of solving problems together, we wouldn’t have had so many arguments in the first place..."