Unable to bear the suffocating place any longer, she stumbled out of the restaurant, even forgetting her suitcase in the entryway. In the garden behind the manor, a cool evening breeze blew, but it couldn't dispel the excruciating pain and nausea in her chest. Clara sat in the veranda, looking at the withered roses outside—the roses she had planted herself, the ones Liam used to water every day, saying, "The roses must be worthy of my Clara." But now, the roses were dead, and their love was dead too.
She gasped for breath, trying to calm her turbulent emotions, when she heard soft footsteps behind her. A scent of perfume wafted on the breeze—not her usual light gardenia, but Vanessa's sweet, cloying rose fragrance.
"Clara?" Vanessa's voice sounded from behind, with a hint of deliberate gentleness. "It's so late, aren't you afraid of catching a cold by yourself here alone?"