Chapter 214 I Will Bear It Together With You
Stefan's limited edition car drove smoothly on the road back to the city, but inside the cabin was a suffocating silence.
Cecilia leaned against the window, watching the neon lights rapidly retreating outside. The city's prosperity turned into a blur of light and shadow in her eyes.
The shock of Cecilia's identity being exposed, Bronte's crazed grief, the exhaustion from confronting Rufus - wave after wave crashed against Cecilia's taut nerves.
The strength seemed to have been drained from her body. Even moving a finger felt difficult.
Stefan sat beside her without speaking, only turning up the heat in the car a bit.
He could feel Cecilia's fragility at this moment. Her spirit was on the edge of collapse - any unnecessary question might make her completely break down.
In another car, Bronte, who had been given a sedative, had fallen into a deep sleep, accompanied by professional medical staff.
Assistant Garth had already contacted a top-tier private sanatorium under the Hensley family at the fastest speed. The place had tight security and a quiet environment, able to provide her with the best care and absolute privacy.
The car didn't head back to The Hensley Mansion or to Cecilia's apartment, but drove into a private estate in the eastern suburbs of the city with extremely high security.
This was Stefan's true private property, an absolutely safe house that even Dione didn't know about.
After the car stopped, Stefan got out first and came around to open the door for Cecilia.
"We're here." He extended his hand.
Cecilia looked at his hand suspended in mid-air, hesitated for a moment, but eventually placed hers in it.
His palm was warm and dry, carrying a firm strength that pulled her out of the cold car.
Just as she steadied herself, a wave of dizzying vertigo struck. Her vision went black, and her body fell forward uncontrollably.
"Amelia!"
Stefan reacted quickly, catching her in his arms. What he felt was the burning temperature of her body.
He frowned and reached for her forehead. The alarming heat made his expression change.
"You have a fever."
She had endured too much mental shock, and her body's defenses had collapsed along with it.
Stefan said no more and simply scooped her up horizontally, striding into the villa.
"Call the family doctor!" he ordered Garth coldly as he followed behind.
Cecilia's consciousness fell into a chaotic sea of fire.
Countless bizarre fragments flashed before her eyes.
The towering fire before her death in her previous life, the searing pain of flames burning her skin; Rufus's crazed state after her death, holding her ashes and muttering to himself; the confusion when she woke up in the hospital after her rebirth; and tonight, Bronte kneeling on the ground slapping herself, that look of despair in her eyes...
Painful, sad, hateful - all the emotions Cecilia had forcibly suppressed erupted completely in this fever.
"No... let me go..." She was seized by nightmares, struggling painfully on the soft bed, her forehead covered in cold sweat.
A cool hand covered her forehead, and then a towel soaked in cold water was gently placed on it, relieving the burning sensation.
A low and gentle voice kept repeating in her ear.
"It's okay, I'm here."
"Amelia, don't be afraid, I'm with you."
This voice carried a soothing power, allowing her to grasp a faint glimmer of light in the abyss of nightmares.
Cecilia unconsciously moved toward that calming presence, tightly gripping the large hand that had been with her all along - it was her only support.
Stefan stayed awake all night.
He sat by the bed, personally changing the towel for her again and again, feeding her water, watching as her breathing gradually steadied under the effect of medication, and her burning temperature slowly came down.
Outside the window, the sky turned from deep black to pale, then to the faint light of dawn.
Looking at her sleeping face, at that face that was usually covered with a layer of frost and wariness but now showed only exhaustion and vulnerability, Stefan felt an unprecedented sharp pain in his heart.
Back from the dead?
An avenger crawling back from hell?
These words were too unbelievable, but when he connected everything that happened tonight with all the moments he had spent with her in the past, he found that this was the only reasonable explanation.
He finally understood where her composure and ruthlessness, so incompatible with her age, came from.
He also finally understood where her irreconcilable hatred for Rufus originated.
She wasn't Cecilia's substitute.
She was Cecilia, who had been hurt to death by Rufus. She had returned, carrying a heart full of blood and tears.
This realization transformed Stefan's feelings for her - from initial appreciation and curiosity, to later attraction, finally settling into a profound emotion mixed with pity, admiration, and a desire to protect her at all costs.
When Cecilia woke up, it was already the afternoon of the next day.
The curtains were drawn, letting in only a bit of hazy light. The room was very quiet, with only steady breathing coming from beside her.
She turned her head and saw Stefan sitting in a single sofa by the bed, eyes closed, seemingly asleep.
He hadn't changed clothes. His white shirt was wrinkled, and his chin showed a shadow of stubble. His whole person showed the exhaustion of running around, yet it still didn't diminish his handsomeness.
Seeming to sense her movement, Stefan opened his eyes almost immediately.
Those eyes that usually held shrewdness and calculation were now clear and full of concern.
"You're awake? How do you feel?" He stood up and touched her forehead. After confirming the fever had broken, he breathed a sigh of relief.
"I..." Cecilia's throat was terribly hoarse. She had barely made a sound when she couldn't help coughing.
Stefan immediately poured a glass of warm water, supporting her shoulder and carefully helping her drink it.
The warm water moistened her parched throat and cleared her confused thoughts considerably.
"Where's my mother?" she asked hoarsely.
"She's in another villa, with the best doctors and caregivers watching her around the clock. Don't worry." Stefan's answer put Cecilia's mind at ease.
The room fell silent again.
Cecilia looked at the dark circles under his eyes and his wrinkled shirt, feeling complicated.
"Thank you," she said softly.
"Between you and me, there's no need for thanks." Stefan pulled over a chair and sat by the bed, looking at her with deep eyes.
Cecilia looked at him. In his eyes, there was no doubt, no fear, only complete trust and patience.
She suddenly felt that those secrets buried deep in her heart, rotting and festering, might finally have someone to share them with.
Cecilia was silent for a long time.
So long that Stefan thought she wouldn't speak, when she finally began, in a tone so calm it was numb, to slowly reveal the story that belonged to "Cecilia."
From her identity as the Ember family's illegitimate daughter, to her youthful encounter with Rufus, to Rufus's absurd mistake about his benefactor, the torture of her three-year marriage with Rufus, her miscarriage after several months of pregnancy, Patrick's suicide, right up to that final fire that burned everything, and how she, as a lonely soul, was bound to Rufus's side, watching him go mad after his sudden realization...
Finally, how Cecilia was reborn in Amelia's body and how she decided to take revenge.
This was a long and cruel complete confession.
Cecilia spoke very flatly, as if telling someone else's story, but her slightly trembling fingertips betrayed the raging storm in her heart.
Stefan listened quietly throughout, never interrupting her once.
His expression, following her narration, went from shock to darkness, and finally, those deep eyes churned with towering anger and extreme heartache.
When Cecilia finished her last sentence, the entire room fell deathly silent.
She lowered her eyes, not daring to look at his expression, mentally prepared to be treated as crazy.
However, the distance and doubt she had anticipated didn't come.
The next second, she was pulled into a warm and forceful embrace, held tightly.
Stefan held her, his arms so tight he seemed to want to merge her into his bones and blood.
He said nothing, only pressed his chin against the top of her head, his body trembling slightly from the fury and heartache he was desperately suppressing.
He needed no evidence.
He believed her.
He unconditionally believed every word she said.
So this was what she had been through.
So this was how she had walked step by step to stand before him, in such a tragic way.
"I'm sorry." After a long while, he finally spoke hoarsely. "I'm sorry I came too late."
Cecilia's body stiffened in his arms.
That belated warmth and understanding was more powerful than any comforting words, instantly breaking down all her hard shell.
The grievances, pain, and exhaustion of fighting alone through two lifetimes all turned into scalding tears at this moment, silently soaking the shirt on his chest.
"I couldn't be part of your past." Stefan tightened his arms, using a tone like an oath, saying word by word in her ear.
"But for your future, I'll be with you to the end."
"What Rufus owes you, what the Ember family owes you, everyone who hurt you... I'll accompany you and make them all pay."
"From now on, your hatred is my hatred. Your past, I'll bear it with you."