To the Love of My Life

Ruby Gregory didn’t sleep too long this time, waking up after only half an hour. When she opened her eyes, Steve Burton appeared to be sleeping beside her, with his eyes squinted.

Ruby habitually reached for her phone at the edge of the bed, and after searching for a while, she couldn’t find her phone but woke Steve up instead.

Steve sounded drowsy as he spoke: “What are you looking for?”

“My phone.”

Without saying anything, Steve got out of bed, walked to the coat rack, and took Ruby’s phone out of her bag. However, as he was about to hand her the phone, he caught a glimpse of some painkillers in her bag, and a slight frown crossed his brow.

He remembered seeing four painkillers left in the morning, but now there were only two. What had happened?

“Did you find it?” Ruby rolled over in bed and asked Steve.

Steve blinked, concealing his emotions, and let out a light “Mm” as if nothing had happened. He then walked to the side of the bed and handed Ruby her phone.

Ruby accepted her phone with a radiant smile, unlocked it, and looked at some unread messages and started replying to them.

Steve stood still by the bed, watching Ruby, waiting for her to finish responding to the messages. When she finally looked up and saw him, he managed a slight smile: “It’s almost time for me to get off work. Should we go out and grab something to eat?”

“Sure.” Ruby’s phone seemed to receive another message, and after briefly responding to it, she set the phone aside and said, “I’m going to take a bath.”

With that, she picked up her clothes nearby and went into the bathroom.

Steve stared at Ruby’s disappearing figure behind the bathroom door for a long time before finally shifting his gaze. It took only a second for his eyes to land on Ruby’s bag hanging on the coat rack, and the missing painkillers reappeared in his mind.

Ruby simply took a quick bath and came out of the bathroom soon after. Holding a towel, she wiped her hair while looking into the cheval mirror in the bedroom.

Through the mirror, Steve could see her slightly red cheeks, flushed from the warm bath.

As Ruby put down the towel and started using a hair dryer, she caught Steve’s gaze in the mirror. She paused for a moment, then looked at him and asked, “Aren’t you going to take a bath?”

“Yes.” Steve only said one word and remained silent, his eyes still locked on Ruby. About half a minute later, he got out of bed and went into the bathroom.

By the time Steve came out of the bathroom, Ruby was already dressed and doing her hair in front of the mirror.

Steve grabbed a clean set of clothes from a nearby wardrobe, put them on, then picked out two ties and walked to the mirror.

Ruby had just finished combing her hair and saw Steve trying to decide which tie was appropriate. She tilted her head, looked at the choices, and pointed to a dark red tie, saying, “This one.”

Steve glanced at Ruby and handed her the dark red tie.

Ruby knew that Steve wanted her to help tie the tie, so she quickly tied up her long hair and stood on her toes to put the tie around Steve’s neck.

Steve looked down at Ruby, his eyes fixed on her as she concentrated on helping him with the tie. His long eyelashes flickered gently before he asked, “Has the injury from the kidnapping healed? Do you still feel discomfort anywhere?”