Year After Year Infatuated

Time flew by, and three years slipped away.

I had been cooking for Christian Sterling for three solid years.

Since lunch hours occasionally got busy, I frequently delivered tiffin boxes straight to his office, making my face a familiar sight to all his employees.

On one occasion when a client was present and asked who I was, he simply smiled and said I was a friend.

Those individuals didn’t pry further, though their glances toward me carried a distinct, knowing implication.

Feigning ignorance, I used the networking opportunities when Christian Sterling introduced me to clients to steadily expand my professional connections.

Given a readymade network on a silver platter, refusing to use it would have been foolish.

Yet what I hadn’t expected was that after three years of quiet, a new storm would brew from Julian Vance’s end.

Shortly after securing a stable job here, my name—Evelyn—suddenly blew up across domestic social media.

Julian Vance had issued a global bounty notice declaring he was searching for his runaway girlfriend, accompanied by candid photos of me.

In the video, looking considerably weathered and haggard, he affectionately recounted our journey of falling in love, ultimately promising a reward of five million US dollars to anyone who provided clues leading to my whereabouts.

Netizens waxed poetic over the CEO’s deep devotion while raining abuse on me for being an ungrateful, heartless woman.

Right as the manhunt notice reached peak virality, a new wave of defamatory reports targeting me surfaced.

Anonymous accounts painted me as a malicious homewrecker who had coveted someone else’s boyfriend back in college, orchestrating misunderstandings to break up the couple and climb into the coveted spot of official partner.

Blurry photographs flooded the internet—entirely snapshots from college featuring Julian Vance and Vivienne holding hands affectionately while I lingered in the background.

Clearly, my gaze in those photos was merely sweeping across the frame during a candid snap, but through the warped lens of internet trolls, it was auto-translated into a gaze filled with hatred and malice, making my face look terrifyingly like a scheming mistress…

My office superiors and colleagues stared at the online articles and photos before turning to look at me.

“Is this you, Evelyn?”

Name and appearance matched identically; how could I possibly deny it?

Fearing the situation would spiral into an intractable nuisance, I sought out Christian Sterling.

“Are you asking me for help?”

Sipping his tea leisurely, he flashed a lazy, carefree smile.

I lowered my gaze: “Yes.”

“This is the first time in three whole years you’ve asked me for a favor.”

“Can you get those photos and posts taken down?”

“I don’t possess powers quite that grand.” He shrugged with utter candor.

My heart sank slightly.

Yet he suddenly leaned closer, eyeing me with an amused grin: “However, I do know a method to ensure he never dares to pester you again.”

“What is it?”

“Marry me…”

Before I could wrinkle my nose in disgust, he let out a sharp bark of laughter and dropped the teasing facade: “Just kidding, obviously not.”

I was speechless; this man was truly asking for a beating.

“Still, the Vance Group is an enterprise built jointly by you and him. You must understand its internal workings inside out, right?”

As expected.

Giving him a knowing look, I thought to myself that indeed, there was no such thing as a free lunch in this world.

The tail he hid for three years had finally exposed itself.

“You want me to help you take down the Vance Group?”

Before he could confirm, I nodded: “Deal. I can help you secure the core confidential files of the Vance Group.”

Christian Sterling’s smile froze.

His lips twitched as if wanting to say something, but I met his gaze with a serene smile: “If President Christian wanted to utilize me to deal with the Vance Group, you should have spoken up earlier. I wouldn’t have refused—why bother waiting patiently for three whole years?”

On the day I returned to the country with Christian Sterling, I finally realized that Julian Vance’s manhunt wasn’t a recent development—he had been searching relentlessly for the past three years without stopping for a single day.

It was only recently picked up by a prominent foreign travel blogger who found the romance touching and turned it into a short documentary video, which fortuitously went viral.

That explained why the news reached me all the way in Germany.

Throughout my three years abroad, I had deliberately cut off ties and refrained from checking domestic news.

Had it not spilled over into international feeds, I would have remained entirely oblivious.

The day after settling into my new accommodation, I walked straight into the Vance Group headquarters.

Three years wasn’t particularly long, and a large portion of the staff still recognized me.

Back then they might have called me Sister Evelyn, but deep down they held zero respect for me—especially after Vivienne arrived, when their gazes turned openly mocking and derisive.

Now, encountering me once again, everyone’s expressions turned deeply complex.

Clearly, word of the CEO’s grand global manhunt had reached every corner.

An employee gasped in shock: “Sister Evelyn, why are you…”

Before the question could leave her lips, Dorian marched out aggressively.

“Well, well! Hearing Julian is going crazy looking for you, you came crawling back? Figures, women like you love playing hard to get!”

Three years apart, Dorian’s toxic personality remained completely unchanged.

“Evelyn, are you crawling back for money or a title this time? Don’t be so endlessly greedy, whatever doesn’t belong to you—oof!”

Before he could finish his sentence, a sudden heavy punch flew out of nowhere and knocked him sprawling to the floor.

Looking entirely unhinged, Julian Vance pinned him down with bloodshot eyes and rained punches on him: “Who gave you permission to insult her?!”

I watched the two of them brawl with detached indifference, until Julian Vance slowly stood up and walked toward me, his voice trembling as it escaped his lips:

“Evelyn…”

His tone was brimming with grievance and vulnerability.

An outsider looking on would think I was the one who had wronged him.

“Evelyn, you’re finally back. I thought you’d abandoned me forever.”

The man who once claimed to despise public displays of affection now completely disregarded the stares of surrounding employees, pulling me into a fierce embrace in the middle of the grand lobby, his eyes burning red.

I felt profoundly nauseated.

Yet recalling the plan agreed upon with Christian Sterling, I forced myself not to shove him away.

“I saw your manhunt notice.”

He released me, suddenly remembering the gazes lingering around us.

Dragging me into his private office, he slammed the door shut before speaking:

“It’s my fault for letting you endure such grievances. From now on, I will definitely compensate you tenfold.”

Noticing my skeptical expression, he offered an apologetic, frantic explanation:

“Vivienne and I are completely finished; the child in her belly belongs to her ex-husband and has nothing to do with me. The only reason I played along with registering our marriage back then was because she clung like a leech demanding custody rights. That night at the banquet, some old acquaintances of her ex-husband’s family were present, so I just played along to throw them off. But I genuinely had no idea you understood German, I swear I never meant to hurt you…”

Suppressing the urge to spit in his face, I replied flatly, “Got it,” and continued: “Let bygones be bygones. My only purpose in coming back today is to tell you to stop broadcasting those absurd search notices—it’s disrupting my work.”

“Alright, alright, since you’re back I’ll have them taken down immediately.”

Overjoyed as if striking gold, he reached out to pull me into his arms again, leaning in for a kiss.

I calmly tilted my head to dodge: “As for Dorian, he’s always picking fights with me. I don’t want to see his face ever again; please tell your friend to keep him away from my life.”

He froze, a dark shadow crossing his features as realization dawned.

“Don’t worry, I’ll make sure he never gets a chance to cross your path again.”