Page 7 of Billionaire’s Heartbreak

“Mrs. Li’s team will handle them,” Dave answered, steady as ever, like the world wasn’t tilting under my feet.

A long minute of shoving, squeezing, and breathless jostling later, we broke through. We stood at the center of the disturbance. The reason everyone had gathered.

“Kai.” Every hair on the back of my neck rose.

That voice. A voice that had lived only in my dreams for the past year.

“June.”

Her name left my mouth before my brain caught up. Maybe this was a dream. Maybe I was hallucinating from the heat, from the pressure in my skull.

And she was there. Right in front of me. Real. Breathing.

I had known she would be here. But knowing and seeing were two different things.

She looked… wrong. Not physically, not exactly. She was still beautiful—painfully so—but the light in her seemed dimmed, like someone had turned down her brightness. Dark circles shadowed her eyes. Her shoulders carried something heavy, invisible.

A few strands of hair had escaped around her face, stirred by the damp breeze, and there was a faint flush across her cheeks from the heat.

My stomach twisted, and it took everything in me not to step forward and pull her into my arms.

Behind her, in the middle of the road, a cluster of men stood over someone curled on the ground. A few cars had stopped at the roadside, their engines idling while curious onlookers gathered behind the security barriers.

“What happened?” The words fell out of me, instinctive.

“Nothing important,” Dannie’s voice cut in smoothly. I hadn’t even registered him until then. He stepped closer, offering a hand. “Good of you to come.”

“Condolences,” I said, taking his hand. “I’m sorry for your loss.”

His palm was warm despite the coolness settling into the air. He pulled me into a hug. His arms were firm, but there was a tremor there—strength wrapped around something fragile.

I caught the faint scent of his cologne, mixed with cigarette smoke and the sharp sweetness of incense clinging to his black suit.

“Come inside,” he murmured.

I glanced again toward the road. “And that… if you needed help⁠—”

“Just an idiot causing a scene,” Dannie replied, his expression smooth, unreadable. “No reason to dirty your hands.”

“Hey, guys.” Lucy’s hand slipped into mine from behind, warm, grounding. I glanced down at our hands. Her fingers curled naturally around mine, the simple gesture reminding me of the image we were supposed to present: husband and wife, parents, a family standing together during a difficult time.

“Sorry we’re late. Traffic was…” Lucy hugged Dannie politely, still holding onto me like an anchor. Then she gave June a careful smile. “Nice to see you.”

Dannie moved beside June, his arm sliding around her shoulders. He squeezed gently, reassuring her, then leaned down and pressed a kiss to her forehead, whispering something only she could hear.

Something inside me burned—fast and ugly. I looked away before the heat in my face could betray me.

“Right,” June said, her voice distant, almost mechanical. “Come.”

She walked ahead of us, and we followed.

“You look well,” Lucy offered.

It sounded polite, necessary but not entirely true. Lucy was good at occasions like this. Social, polished, always knowing exactly what to say. She knew how to make people feel at ease, how to keep a conversation moving, how to say the right thing without saying too much. Everything I could have asked for in a wife.

The truth was, June looked thinner. Tired. Like sleep had become a stranger.

She paused mid-step, glancing at Huan Huan. “How old is your little one?”