Pregnant With His Heir, He Married The Actress Instead Chapter 10

Pregnant With His Heir, He Married The Actress Instead Chapter 10

I stayed in San Diego for half a year before changing my name and taking a job with the BBC in London.

I excelled at the job, and before long, I was promoted to news director.

Four years later, when I returned to Seattle, everything had changed.

Seattle Broadcast Network was airing the morning news:

“Today is December 25, 2025, Christmas Day. The weather service says it may snow tomorrow. The last snowfall in Seattle was four years ago. We hope everyone gets to kiss the person they love in the snow.”

The next day, after the centennial event ended, I walked out through the university gates and realized it really was snowing.

Seattle winters were damp and bitterly cold.

Snowflakes landed on the tip of my nose.

I buried my face in my scarf and rubbed at it lightly when a low, familiar voice sounded behind me.

“Excuse me, would you mind taking a picture for me?”

My whole body stiffened.

I turned around and met the man’s sharp, handsome face.

It was Zayne.

Time had carved his features into something even deeper and more defined than before.

What had not changed was that lofty arrogance that belonged only to a pampered rich heir. Even the wooden handle of the umbrella in his hand seemed to carry an expensive woody scent.

“Could you take one for me?” he asked with a faint laugh, breaking the silence first. “My wife takes a picture here every year after the alumni celebration.”

“She’s away on a work trip this time, so she couldn’t make it.”

“She asked me to come in her place, but I’m terrible with cameras.”

I stood there woodenly.

A cold gust of wind pressed the hem of my dress against my legs, sending a shiver through me.

Quietly, I asked, “Your wife?”

“Yes.” There was unmistakable pride on his face. “My wife’s name is Raina Lane. She’s one of SMU’s distinguished alumni. She used to be a war correspondent, and she even won the UN’s top award for journalism.”

He sounded proud.

But he also sounded as though he were murmuring to himself.

I froze for a second, then took the camera from his hand and snapped a photo facing the university gate.

I had only heard two years earlier that Zayne jumped into the ocean for me.

After the Hale family pulled him out, they forcibly admitted him to a psychiatric hospital.

The treatment didn’t go well.

Later, he lost his memory.

For one brief moment, I had felt sorry for him.

But from beginning to end, I had never planned to see him again.

“Thank you,” Zayne said, taking the camera back. He lowered his eyes to look at me. “You took it exactly the way my wife does. If the two of you ever met, I think she’d really like you.”

“Miss, what’s your name?”

I said nothing.

Then he glanced at the badge pinned to my chest.

His deep eyes gradually darkened, as if ink had spread through them.

“Your name is Raina too?”

I gave a small start and was about to speak when several bodyguards came running over from the distance.

“Mr. Hale, you’re having another episode.”

Zayne shoved them away and snarled, “Get lost. I’m not sick. I saw Raina.”

“She’s right here. She was just talking to me.”

One of the bodyguards looked around and found nothing.

Snow was falling everywhere, and there was not even a single footprint on the ground.

He let out a sigh.

“Mr. Hale, you really are getting worse.”

“Miss Lane is dead. Don’t you remember? After you jumped into the sea, they found her body offshore.”

“You buried her in the Hale family cemetery.”

Zayne’s expression darkened, and rage flared across his face. “I told you, I’m not sick. I’m fine.”

“Raina is still alive. I’m going to find her.”

“If any of you try to stop me again, I’ll kill you.”

But outnumbered, he was still forced into the car.

The snow kept falling harder.

Beneath the big old maple by the gates of Seattle Metropolitan University stood a Christmas music box.

Soon it was buried under the blizzard.

…

Julian sent me a message saying he was leaving the harbor the next morning.

At five a.m., I reached East Harbor Terminal and found him maintaining his sailboat.

“Julian, can you take me with you again?” I called out.

His hands paused, and he turned around sharply. “Miss Lane, where are you going this time?”

“To find the treasure the Pirate King left behind.”

That made him laugh.

“Miss Lane, are you trying to be the captain now?”

“No.”

I held up the compass in my hand.

“I want to be the navigator.”

Once we set sail, I watched Seattle blur farther and farther into the distance.

Then I smiled in relief.

Everything I wrote in those letters to Zayne had been true.

But it was also true that I didn’t love him anymore.

After seeing him in that shattered state today, I knew the rest of his life would be spent drowning in regret.

And he would suffer a hundred times more than I ever had.

I left the bad memories behind me.

Time, the sailboat, and I were all moving forward.