He Kept Me Hidden Then Pushed Me To Date Others Chapter 09
“Before I left, you promised you’d wait for me. And then you spent five years with her!”
“Don’t I get to be angry about that? Ethan, you used to love me. And that day at the lab, you chose
me too.”
She wrapped her arms around him. “Claire’s married now. Stop thinking about her.”
She tried to say more, but he shoved her off.
Ethan’s eyes were bloodshot. “Gemma! I let you stay because we were friends! You said that confession was just to get your family off your back-that it was for show! You promised to erase all the footage! This was all a setup to destroy Claire!”
He packed her things and tossed them out. “Find somewhere else to live.”
Gemma saw the cold finality in his face. She knew he wouldn’t listen to another word. She left.
Ethan spent a day listing every friend and coworker who’d badmouthed me.
The next day, he fired everyone in the lab who’d insulted me.
The entire project team was let go. Grad students were reassigned to other advisors.
He cut off every friend who’d spoken against me. Then he used his family’s company to pressure
their businesses.
He rescinded my suspension and posted a public statement admitting he’d misled everyone. Then
he resigned as dean.
My transfer to Stonehaven was finalized.
Ethan did everything he could think of. Then he came to find me one last time.
He caught me at the airport. His head was bowed, his voice quiet, but there was a pale, sad smile on
his face.
“Claire… what if I told you I finally see all my mistakes? All the years I took you for granted?”
“If I’d made us public five years ago… do you think things would have turned out differently?”
I just looked at him. “No what-ifs.”
He didn’t argue. He just watched me walk away.
I heard later that Ethan kept waiting, hoping I’d come back.
That one day I’d remember all our good times and leave Nathan.
He never got that chance. Before the year was out, the Holloway family empire collapsed.
Ethan had been too aggressive in taking down his old friends.
They banded together-Derek leading the charge after Ethan ruined his wedding.
They sabotaged Holloway Enterprises from the inside.
A year of coordinated pressure, and the company buckled.
He filed for bankruptcy. Sold off what was left. All he had left was enough to get by.
When he realized he could never give me the life he’d wanted to, he stopped hoping I’d return.
Nathan moved to Stonehaven that same month.
We never looked back. We just lived our lives.
