Chapter 62 Chloe Picks Up Nathan After Work
Ever since miraculously returning to this timeline, this was the one painfully ordinary thing she had desperately craved doing. Nathan always picked her up; he was so fiercely protective he barely let her out of his sight. But today, with the commercial shoot wrapping early, she finally had the perfect opportunity to surprise him.
She hailed a taxi, gave the driver the address, and headed straight for the University of Chicago.
Nathan’s primary pharmaceutical lab was anchored on the sprawling, gothic campus, where he aggressively spearheaded new neuro-drug research projects in direct collaboration with the prestigious Pritzker School of Medicine. On top of running a multi-million-dollar corporate lab, Nathan served as an elite adjunct professor, supervising a small army of hand-picked graduate students and teaching a handful of highly exclusive, packed-to-capacity lecture courses each month.
For Chloe, stepping onto the Pritzker campus felt like a violent, beautiful collision of past and present. The medical school was located just a few blocks from her own former university. Back in her college days, she had shamelessly invaded this exact campus almost every single week just to hunt him down.
Drowning in a wave of golden nostalgia, Chloe slowly walked through the wrought-iron entrance gates.
She navigated the familiar, tree-lined paths, passing historic stone buildings until she finally slipped deep into the ultra-modern laboratory science wing.
Looking through the heavy glass walls of the main lab, she immediately spotted him.
Nathan was standing in the dead center of the gleaming room, completely surrounded by a circle of tense, exhausted-looking graduate students. He was clad in a crisp, blindingly white lab coat that perfectly accentuated his broad shoulders. He was deep in lecture, his expression one of absolute, cold authority, effortlessly dismantling a complex string of biochemical data. The entire room was completely suffocated by his brilliant, intimidating academic presence.
Chloe stood quietly outside the glass door, totally mesmerized by the sight of her husband in his element, until someone suddenly tapped her shoulder.
"Hey, are you lost? Looking for someone?"
Chloe jumped, spinning around to find a rushed grad student holding a stack of files. "Oh—no, I..."
Before she could explain, the student pushed past her, swiping his keycard and slipping into the lab.
Inside, the intense academic dissection seemed to finally conclude. The suffocating tension in the room instantly evaporated, shoulders dropping as nervous laughter and relieved conversation filled the sterile space.
The student who had just walked in dumped his files on a counter and pointed toward the glass doorway. "Hey, whose girlfriend is that? She's been waiting out in the hall staring at us for ten minutes!"
Every single male student in the lab immediately whipped their heads toward the door.
Standing in the hallway was a stunning girl bundled in a chic, pale-yellow autumn coat. Her delicate, dewy features radiated a warm, breathtaking smile as she gazed inside. She was the exact, devastating type of girl that could effortlessly bring a man to his knees.
"Not mine."
"Definitely not mine. I wish."
The boys exchanged rapid, completely envious glances, fiercely whispering and wondering whose girlfriend such a beautiful, vibrant woman could possibly be.
Nathan stopped writing on his clipboard. He turned his head, his dark eyes locking onto the figure through the glass.
The terrifying, icy professor persona instantly, completely shattered.
He methodically peeled off his blue nitrile gloves, unbuttoned his white lab coat, and draped it over a chair. He walked smoothly toward the door, his deep voice carrying effortlessly across the silent room.
"She's mine."
"Whoa!" The entire lab of exhausted graduate students froze in absolute shock before immediately erupting into chaotic cheers and whistles.
"Professor Archer actually has a girlfriend?!"
"This is going to completely devastate half the female population on campus!"
Nathan pushed the glass door open, his arm immediately, possessively wrapping around Chloe’s waist to pull her flush against his side. "Correction," he announced smoothly, a rare, breathtaking smile playing on his lips as he let his students relentlessly tease him. "She is my wife."
The lab erupted again.
"That's all for today," Nathan commanded over the noise, his eyes never leaving Chloe's. "Double-check the centrifuge data before you leave. I'm heading out."
"Goodbye, Professor Archer!"
"Have a good night, Mrs. Archer!"
The students waved cheerfully through the glass. Nathan laced his fingers securely through Chloe’s, and the two of them walked away down the quiet, polished corridor.
A few desperately curious students crept to the doorway, shamelessly watching the couple stroll hand-in-hand out of the building.
"They seem insanely close."
"That woman looks incredibly young. Could she be an undergrad from the art department?"
"Hey, cut the gossip," one of the older PhD candidates snapped. "Professor Archer has been a completely closed book for a decade. The man is over forty, a literal genius, and richer than god—what's wrong with him finally dating?"
"Exactly. Besides, he's basically untouchable. Who cares if she's younger?"
Chloe and Nathan walked out into the cool Chicago evening. At first, they simply walked side by side, but within seconds, Chloe naturally gravitated closer, slipping her arm through his and completely nestling her body against his side, perfectly matching his long strides.
Nathan glanced down at her, a profound, aching softness in his eyes, and pulled her a fraction closer.
"Something just occurred to me today," Chloe murmured, leaning her head against his bicep.
"Go ahead."
"Back when I was a freshman, you explicitly promised that you would introduce me to a handsome medical student to be my boyfriend. Why the hell did that never actually happen?"
"How did I not introduce you?" Nathan raised a perfectly arrogant eyebrow. "I literally introduced you to the absolute best guy on this entire campus."
"Oh really? Who?"
"Me." Nathan chuckled, a low, gravelly sound that sent a shiver straight down her spine.
Chloe laughed, a bright, melodic sound. "Alright, Professor, I guess you're right about that! But wait," she paused, her brow furrowing slightly. "Back then... I was the one who aggressively pursued you. If I hadn't made the first brazen move and cornered you, would you have ever actually pursued me?"
Nathan stopped walking. He looked down at her, a deep, highly offended frown creasing his forehead. "Actually, Chloe... I've literally had a burning question about this for over twenty years."
"What?"
"Why did you always confidently assume you were the one pursuing me?"
"Wasn't I?!" Chloe blinked, genuinely baffled.
Nathan let out a breath of absolute disbelief. "Before we even officially dated... who violently insisted on taking you out to an expensive dinner every single week?"
"You did."
"Who aggressively forced you to sit in the library and personally tutored you before every single one of your exams?"
"You did."
"Who drove you all the way back to your dorm after every holiday break, physically carried your heavy luggage, paid for your flights, and violently guarded an empty seat for you in the dining hall?"
"You did."
"Who constantly bought you your favorite snacks, stocked your dorm with daily necessities, and manufactured entirely fake study sessions just to invite you to hang out?"
Chloe bit her lip. "Okay, when you list it out like that... that is actually quite a lot."
Nathan glared at her, completely exasperated. "Besides me... were there any other guys allowed within a ten-foot radius of you?"
"No way," Chloe shook her head honestly. "Just platonic friends."
"Forget it." Nathan let out a heavy sigh, pinching the bridge of his nose. "You are completely doing this on purpose. You only ever remember your own dramatic confession, and you completely, totally erase my years of absolute, pathetic devotion."
"No! I just thought what you did was... normal classmate stuff! Weren't we just study buddies exchanging academic ideas?"
"Exchanging ideas?!" Nathan looked at her like she had lost her mind. "Who the hell was exchanging academic ideas with you?! What did you ever actually do for my academics? Wasn't it literally always me dragging you across the finish line? With your atrocious freshman grades, what intellectual property could we possibly exchange?!"
Nathan genuinely couldn't bear talking to a woman who was this terrifyingly oblivious. All those agonizing, desperate years of him aggressively marking his territory and laying the groundwork meant absolutely nothing to her! Her brazen dorm-room confession hadn't been because she was deeply moved by his quiet devotion at all!
"Then what the hell did you actually like about me?!" Nathan demanded, his pride taking a massive hit.
Chloe let out a highly awkward, guilty chuckle. "Everything," she lied smoothly.
\I absolutely cannot admit to this man that I just fell completely, ferociously in love with his devastatingly handsome face and his broad shoulders, she thought, mortified.
"Really?" Nathan pressed, narrowing his eyes suspiciously.
"Yes! We're both mature adults now! Why drag up the messy past?" Chloe laughed nervously, aggressively tugging his arm to get him walking again. "How about I make tomato-braised beef for dinner tonight?"
"Sounds perfect. We still have prime cuts of beef at the house. I'll swing by the high-end supermarket and grab some organic tomatoes," Nathan smoothly surrendered, completely willing to let her change the subject if it meant she was cooking for him.
"We're totally out of fruit, too. We need apples and oranges for Mason."
"Alright. I'll handle the groceries," Nathan agreed.
Walking side by side along the darkening campus path, they seamlessly fell into a domestic discussion about dinner plans, looking exactly like a couple who had been happily married for decades. All the brutal, agonizing pain of the twenty-three-year gap seemed to completely evaporate into the crisp night air, leaving only this warm, absolute perfection.
That pristine domestic bubble shattered violently at 8:00 PM.
Chloe was standing in the kitchen, chopping tomatoes, when her cell phone rang with an unknown local number.
It was the Chicago Police Department.
The dispatch officer on the line bluntly asked if she was the emergency contact for a man named George, who was currently sitting in a holding cell and desperately demanding to see her.
Completely panicked and entirely uncertain why the mild-mannered bus driver was locked up, Chloe immediately dragged Nathan out the door and rushed to the downtown precinct.
Sitting in the stark, fluorescent-lit interrogation room, the brutal reality of their situation came crashing down.
According to the exhausted detective, George had gotten into a violent, bloody altercation with a man in an alleyway in the middle of the night, beating him so severely the victim required emergency hospitalization and reconstructive surgery.
The hospitalized man was aggressively pressing felony assault charges against George, and the preliminary arraignment was already set for the end of the week.
George was a completely displaced ghost. He had absolutely zero legal identity in this timeline, no money, and no defense attorney. If he was convicted, he was going to be thrown into a modern, brutal prison system that would chew him up and spit him out.
Since he literally didn't know a single living soul in this horrifying, alien world, he had begged the police to track down the only other survivor he knew—Chloe—desperately praying she would save him from the abyss.