Chapter 1

On the very first day I married my CEO husband, I told him plainly that I didn't care what he did outside.

He could flirt, have affairs, whatever he wanted—as long as he kept it out of our home. If he ever brought it to my doorstep, I would walk away for good.

He had kept that promise for years. Even when he fell for his new secretary, he kept her tucked away somewhere else, never allowing her to show up in front of me.

But she had a problem with following rules.

On our fifth wedding anniversary, she sent a delivery to our house. It was a cake.

When I opened the box, the top was covered with a printed photo of her and my husband, pressed up against each other like they had nothing to hide.

I took a long breath and closed the lid. At that moment, I knew our five-year marriage had finally reached its end.

*****

After tossing the cake into the trash, I sat there in silence, staring at the city lights outside the window.

The wedding photo on my nightstand showed the two of us smiling like we were deeply in love.

My husband, Daniel Jenkins, had his arm around me, whispering promises to love me and keep me safe.

I never imagined those promises came with an expiration date—five years, exactly.

I opened my laptop, my hands shaking as I clicked into the social media account he had stayed logged into.

I saw a message. It wrote: [Danny, I miss you. Are you coming over tonight?]

Message after message filled the screen—intimate, blatant, absolutely shameless. All from someone saved in his contacts as Olivia.

The earliest ones were from a year ago, and each line burned hotter than the last.

I slammed the laptop shut.

So for an entire year, I'd been walking around like an idiot while the two of them carried on behind my back.

Just then, a verification request popped up on my phone.

I clicked accept, and the messages came instantly.

[Hi, Sophie, I heard today is your tenth wedding anniversary with Daniel! What a coincidence. It's also the one-year anniversary of when we met!]

[I heard you got a big cake today. Lucky you. I only got a little gift.]

Then she sent a selfie.

A pretty girl smiled at the camera, holding up a property deed with Olivia Reed printed in bold letters.

I zoomed in despite the nausea twisting in my stomach—only to realize the house Daniel bought her was in the exact same neighborhood as mine.

Of course. Hiding in plain sight—the oldest trick in the book.

I closed the picture with a cold laugh and didn't bother replying.

After being kept in the shadows for a year, she clearly wanted to rub it in my face. So I decided to do the one thing she couldn't stand—ignore her completely.

I opened Olivia's Instagram and scrolled through to the very beginning—the day they first met.

The photo was taken in a hospital. She was lying in a bed, and Daniel was sitting beside her, sketching her in oils like he had all the time in the world.

The look on her face said everything. She had fallen for him right then.

Oil portraits had always been Daniel's specialty. Whenever I got upset, he would pull out his easel and paint me until I couldn't stay angry anymore.

Our home was filled with portraits of me—dozens, maybe hundreds.

Then I looked at the date of the post.

It was the same day I went in for my first IVF treatment.

Daniel had told me he bumped into a young woman on his way to the hospital, and that she needed help.

So he stayed to take care of her for half a month.

When my first IVF round failed, I even suggested visiting Olivia with him. He refused, saying I needed to focus on recovering and shouldn't stress myself out.

I had no idea he just didn't want me to see that he was spending his time with another woman.

*****

By the time Daniel came home that night, my emotions had already settled. I sat calmly on the sofa and watched him walk in.

"Sophie, you scared me," he said.

His tone softened as he held out a gift like he was showing off a treasure. "This is the real present I picked out for you. It's the necklace you've been talking about forever."

When he leaned closer, I caught the sugary scent of another woman's perfume clinging to his clothes.

I frowned at the necklace in his hand. It was the one I'd kept in my cart for months without buying.

Daniel always remembered every little thing I liked, leaving surprises for me whenever I least expected them.

Maybe that was exactly why I believed the lie for so long.

The cake had obviously been meant for Olivia. She just decided to turn it into a declaration of war by sending it straight to my doorstep.

And since Daniel had spent the day with her, there was no way he hadn't noticed it was missing.

Which left only one explanation—even after realizing she'd exposed their affair, he still chose to protect her and indulge her.

And that kind of affection used to belong to me alone.

"Daniel, do you really have nothing you want to tell me?" I asked.

His expression froze. He stayed silent for a few seconds, then sighed and leaned back against the couch.

"I've always wanted a child," he said. "But you have health issues. All these years, and still nothing."

"But you told me you didn't care," I said, my voice breaking.

He nodded. "I did. But I thought if we kept trying, it would happen eventually. We've gone through multiple IVF rounds, and nothing worked. Olivia... she's willing to have a child for me."

Daniel avoided my eyes. His voice dropped. "Sophie, don't act like a child. You have nothing besides me now.

"And Olivia... she's just a young girl who has just graduated. Don't make things hard for her. This mess is my fault. Whatever you want to do, do it to me."

Every injection, every pill, every sleepless night, and all the pain I went through for IVF had led to this moment.

I stared at him, unable to believe that the man who once said having me was enough for a lifetime could now favor another woman so completely.

Daniel was right about one thing: I did have nothing now.

My grandmother entrusted me—an orphan—to him on her deathbed, asking him to take care of me for the rest of my life.

He made a promise that day. But he didn't keep it.

Losing him meant losing everything.

But I wasn't someone who feared starting over. I never had been.