Chapter 222

Evelyn clutched Nathaniel's arm tightly, shaking him with urgency. "Sir! Hey! Wake up! Don't you dare scare me like this—"

The man exhaled slowly, keeping his eyes shut for nearly a full minute before speaking. "Why did you stop what you were doing?"

'What I was doing—?' Realization dawned on Evelyn, her lips curling in disgust. "Typical man! Don't even think about taking liberties with me!"

Furious at his attempted manipulation, she thrust the remaining leaf-cup of water at him. "Drink it yourself! I nearly broke my back fetching this for you, and it's leaking everywhere!"

Though not thirsty, Nathaniel accepted the offering—her rare act of kindness couldn't be refused. His striking eyes flickered open as he took the makeshift vessel, tilting his head back to drain the last drops.

Then he froze.

The empty reed-leaf cup trembled in his grip. His dark irises contracted sharply. "Have we... met before?"

Evelyn sat hugging her knees nearby, rolling her eyes at what she assumed was another ploy. "Spare me the amnesia act. This isn't the time or place for games."

Nathaniel's expression remained grave. "I mean years ago. A long time ago."

The intensity in his voice gave her pause. Evelyn studied him warily. "Doubtful. I lived in the middle of nowhere until eighteen. No chance I'd cross paths with some city tycoon."

Nathaniel's gaze turned distant, memories surfacing. A decade prior, he'd traveled to rural areas inspecting his company's poverty relief initiatives when rivals ambushed him. Bleeding and desperate, he'd hidden in a village's mountain woods awaiting rescue.

The blood attracted a viper.

As venom coursed through him, a child appeared—no older than ten, yet astonishingly composed. She'd torn her hair ribbon to tourniquet his arm, sucked the poison from his wound with her own mouth, then applied chewed herbs she identified as snakebite antidotes.

For three days she returned with food and water carried in folded leaf-cups just like this one.

Blinded by residual toxins, he never saw her face. When his men finally arrived, the girl was absent. He'd left his mother's prayer beads with a subordinate to gift her, along with an open invitation to seek help at the Grayson estate.

Later, a girl arrived with the beads—Amelia Rivers, who'd been vacationing nearby. The mystery seemed solved.

Until now.

The identical leaf-cup trembled in Nathaniel's hand, its creases mirroring those from a decade past. His voice dropped to a whisper. "It was you."