Mending a Broken Love (Roxanne and Sebastian) novel Chapter 145

Angeline slowly woke up in the hospital, groaning. Every movement sent waves of pain through her body.

"Angeline, you're awake." She looked up at Liam Brooks and asked in a weak voice, "What happened to me?"

Liam looked at her with eyes full of concern. "You were in a car accident."

As Angeline tried to recall, the moment she went off the road and crashed into the river came flooding back. The icy water had rushed in almost instantly.

Her face turned ghostly pale. She had thought she was going to die. And now, somehow, she had survived.

"Did you save me?"

Liam nodded without correcting her. The truth was, even if the others hadn't jumped in first, he would've. He would've saved her.

Angeline was moved to tears and threw her arms around him. "Liam!"

Angeline and Liam had grown up in the same village. She was the neglected one in her family, not receiving any love from her father or mother. She was always the one getting picked on.

Liam's situation wasn't much better. His mother had left the family, his father was disabled, his grandfather was sick, and his grandmother was cruel.

They had both come from hardship, and they quickly became each other's light and comfort in the dark.

But when one was scraping by at the bottom, even love couldn't withstand the weight of survival.

Angeline was proud and driven. She got into college, but she had no money for her living expenses. Her family wouldn't give her a cent.

Liam heard that he could make money overseas, so he left the country to help pay for her tuition. At first, he sent money back every month. Then, the payments stopped and he vanished.

Liam was the one in charge of those checks, and when he looked through the bag, he found a photo of him and Angeline.

It was the only photo they had taken together before he left—something he had spent everything he had on at the time. They had made two copies, and he kept one while Angeline had the other.

His copy had disappeared somewhere along the way, lost during all those years of struggle. This one could only be hers.

He grabbed the thief by the collar, demanding to know who he had taken the bag from and where she was. By the time he found her, she had already called the police and was talking to them about the robbery.

As he got closer, he heard her saying, "The money doesn't matter. I just want that photo."

In that instant, something deep inside him cracked open. After all these years apart, he had thought she had forgotten him, that she had moved on and built a new life. But she remembered him.

Smiling, he stepped forward.