A sharp jolt ran through Matteo's chest. His eyes darted around the living room, searching desperately for something, or rather, for someone.
It was like he was expecting Evelyn to step out at the moment.
"Eve…"

He called her name over and over again, but the panic in his heart only grew stronger.
A thought, an impossible, terrifying thought, began to creep into his mind.
Did Eve leave him? No. He refused to believe it.
"Eve, you're messing with me, right? Come on out, this isn't funny." His voice cracked slightly. "I know I messed up this morning, but Becky and I are really just friends. Please, believe me."
He kept talking, his feet moving restlessly through the house, scanning every corner like she might be hiding somewhere.
But then, he finally noticed it. The estate felt emptier.

Their photos together were gone.
Evelyn's personal belongings were gone.
Everything was gone.
How?

How could everything be gone?
Matteo felt like he was losing his mind.
That nightmare from earlier flashed through his head again. Desperate, he pulled out his phone and tried calling Evelyn.
But all he got was the endless, monotonous ringing of an unanswered call.
His hands trembled as he switched to texting, only for a bright red exclamation mark to appear on the screen.
Evelyn had blocked him.
His pupils shrank. His entire body shook.
A suffocating fear swallowed him whole.
Frantically, he scrolled through his phone, searching for any trace of her on social media.
Nothing.
She had deleted everything.
Every single account was gone.
His mind went blank, his thoughts turning blank.
He racked his brains but couldn't think of where else she could go.
Evelyn's father had passed away when she was a child. Her mother had fallen ill a few years ago and also left this world.
She had nowhere to go.
His last hope was her friends.
Gripping his phone tightly, he made call after call. "Hey? It's Matteo. Is Eve with you?"
"Huh? What the hell are you talking about? Why would she be here?"
All he got was the same response, over and over again. Even his own friends had no idea where she was.
The despair was unbearable.
It felt like he was trapped inside that same nightmare where Evelyn didn't exist.
The feelings he had for her, the ones he had refused to acknowledge, suddenly consumed him entirely.
And now, she was gone.
It was like someone had ripped a piece of flesh straight from his chest.
The agony of it tore through him, threatening to break him completely.
"Eve, stop messing around, okay? I need to see you."
His voice cracked into a hoarse, desperate shout, his eyes bloodshot with rage and grief, like a lion that had lost its mate.
But why?
The question clawed at him.
Memories of their time together flooded his mind.
Then, suddenly, he remembered how he had constantly favored Rebecca.
He remembered how he had ignored Evelyn and how her body suddenly stiffened when she had overheard him speaking Haranese with Alex that day.
"Did Eve learn Haranese?" His voice was barely above a whisper.
The housekeeper hesitated at his strange, almost manic expression before carefully answering, "Ms. Walsh has been studying foreign languages for years, sir. She even hired a private tutor. Didn't you know?"
At this moment, a sharp ringing echoed in his head.
The last thread of control inside him snapped.