She was crying. The tears — silent, running down her cheeks, falling from her jaw — were the tears of a woman whose deepest wound had been opened.
"He wants a child you cannot give him," Tianlong said. The words were gentle. Cruel in their gentleness. "But you could give him one. From someone else. And tell him it is his."
She stared. The horror — the moral horror, the ethical horror, the absolute violation of everything she believed about marriage and fidelity and love — fought with the hope. The desperate, gnawing, years-long hope of a woman who wanted a child.
"No," she whispered. "No. Where would I even find such a man? Who would I— who could I—"
