I've Been There Before

His slender fingers touched the scar.

He could feel the unevenness.

It felt like his fingers were burned as he touched it.

“When it comes to a broken body like this, how could you torture her?” Humbert was still on the phone with his half-taunting tone.

But Caden ignored his teasing as his thumb caressed the scar. Suddenly, he did something so strange to her that he covered it with his palm.

Staring at his palm, he didn’t know what he was doing.

Hearing no voice, Humbert thought Caden had hung up on him.

But he didn’t end the call as he picked up a cigarette and lit it to savor the taste of Nicotine, while Caden said unassumingly, “It’s longer than my palm.”

“What?” Humbert paused a beat before figuring it out. “You mean Grace’s scar on her waist?” Humbert understood him as they had been best friends for so long.

“Even longer than your hand?” Humbert sucked up hard on his cigarette before bubbling a smokey circle.

“Which implies her surgeon was really inexperienced, so terrible that…

Well, when I was in the medical college, our teacher let us remove the human specimen’s kidneys for the first time, but we made the scar much smaller than Grace’s.”

“What do you mean?”

“It means, perhaps…No, it’s certain that her surgeon doesn’t have a medical certificate. You know, people like street surgeons.”

surgeon, surgeons without medical

to

hesitated before Humbert said, “Just one glimpse at her scar can tell me information

“Send me the photo, and you’ll know

persuade Caden, who was too cold and

as he, actually, captured her in the palm of his

Humbert didn’t think Caden should be to blame as it’s hard for people like them to care for a woman. They were

send him the picture as he was about to redirect by laughing, but Caden

shocked to drop his cigarette, which burned his arm on his lap. The sudden pain

hurts. “Wait up, what

message as he asked. “Well…” Holy crap. Caden did send

was a picture of a “true” scar—a nasty one filling the whole

he stared at the picture. Why did he think it implied Caden was unwilling to show him Grace’s bare

it as he studied on

Caden asked

“What?”

scar properly, not to mention

could picture Humbert’s words in his mind

heck was the

it’s your bad attitude and indifference that made her life

acted mean. “Don’t you ever blame me for not reminding you that what Grace had suffered was more than a

about her when she was the daughter of family James, and you

the reason why Grace, a confident and lively girl, would