Chapter 1

After six months away from home, Jameson noticed his social media feeds had gone completely dead.

No more moody midnight statuses.

No more passive aggressive quotes.

And definitely no more endless baby pictures or photos of home cooked meals.

Even when he opened our text thread, my new profile picture looked like a total stranger to him.

The second he recognized the background of that photo, Jameson called me.

"You went to Mori?" he demanded. "Della, you do realize that was supposed to be our makeup honeymoon, right?

"Didn't you say it would only mean something if we went together?"

His constant questions just annoyed me.

"I wanted to go, so I went. What is the big deal?" I snapped.

He had probably never been spoken to like that before. The line went dead silent for a long time before he finally choked out a response.

"How could you..." Jameson was totally lost for words.

He just didn't get it.

It had only been six months.

How did the woman who used to blow up his phone, who posted constantly just for his attention, who had tried so desperately to win him back... change so fast?

*****

I never expected Jameson to actually come back.

Ever since that phone call, he had acted like a totally different person.

He spent two days blowing up my phone like a crazed stalker before randomly showing up on my doorstep.

He had clearly forgotten his own ultimatum from when he moved out: "I am not coming back until you apologize to Maya."

Yet here he was, looking exactly the same.

His assistant, Maya Henderson, was still right by his side, and he still had the nerve to parade her into our home.

But unlike my hysterical breakdown six months ago, I was completely calm.

I even gave Maya a polite nod as she walked in.

Unsurprisingly, she didn't appreciate it.

She just scoffed and strutted inside like she owned the place.

Taking in the completely remodeled living room, she let out a loud gasp before Jameson could even speak.

"Wow, the place looks completely different." Maya didn't even take her shoes off before wandering around to inspect the room.

She turned to Jameson, who was still frozen in the entryway staring at me, and started complaining, "All this new furniture must have cost a fortune. And it is so ugly."

She shot me a nasty glare. "Della, Mr. Cole makes good money, but you can't just burn through it like this.

"Do you have any idea how hard he works? You aren't helping him at all, you are just dragging him down.

"I really don't know what value women like you bring to the table. Are you only good for spending money and having kids?

"Mr. Cole, I am so mad for you! You work yourself to the bone and still have to rush back to deal with this domestic mess."

Playing the part of the coy, defensive girlfriend, Maya sidled right up to Jameson and naturally reached out to take his coat.

In the past, I would have been the one rushing to do that, swallowing my humiliation just to keep the peace.

And Jameson? He used to treat his coat like a prize, forcing me to play a sick game of competing for his favor.

If he was in a good mood, he handed it to me. If he wasn't, he handed it to Maya just to punish me.

Either way, it was pure torture.

But today, all the love and dependency I once had for him was completely gone.

It had been ground into dust by his daily emotional abuse, his endless suspicions, and my agonizing waits.

Funny enough, now that I didn't care anymore, his attitude completely changed.

As he saw that I wasn't even looking at him, something must have crossed Jameson's mind.

He actually dodged Maya's hand and hung up the coat himself.

His voice softened as he looked at me. "It is just some furniture. If my wife likes it, we buy it. As long as she is happy, it is worth every penny."

Maya bit her lip, ready to argue, but Jameson cut her off by holding up a hand.

He practically shoved her aside to guide me to the sofa, sitting me down with his arm wrapped securely around my shoulders.

"Alright, honey. I know you have had these six months to reflect on things," he coaxed. "As long as you stop throwing tantrums, start trusting me, and focus on our home, I will not move out again. Okay?

"From now on, I will read every single text you send and reply right away. I will never ignore you again."

When I didn't say anything, he pulled me closer and gave me a little shake. "Hmm? Does that sound good?"

"Oh," I replied flatly.

I stood up, slipped out of his grasp, and moved to the opposite end of the couch.

Jameson froze. "Oh? That is all you have to say?"

I looked up at him. "Yeah? What did you expect?"

"What did you expect?" Those used to be Jameson's favorite words to shut me down.

When I asked him if he was skipping family dinner again, he would say, "What did you expect? Is the work going to finish itself?"

When I got upset that he bailed on our daughter's school play, he would say, "What did you expect? Was I supposed to leave my clients hanging?"

When I begged him to watch his health and drink less at corporate dinners, he would give me a dismissive smirk, looking at me like I was an idiot. "What did you expect?

"Do you think sitting at home making useless comments is going to magically put money in our bank account?"

He always left me speechless and suffocated, unable to argue back.

After all, I couldn't exactly bring myself to ask the real question: Why did your late-night networking magically quadruple the moment Maya Henderson joined the company?

Besides, voicing those kinds of baseless suspicions felt like it would damage our relationship.

Plus, I just didn't want to believe that Jameson, a man who was always so rational and composed, would ever betray me. Betray our family.

But reality didn't bend just because you didn't want to accept it.

I forget exactly when it started, but Maya's name suddenly took over his life.

At first, it was just a casual comment. "Honey, did you switch to a jasmine body wash?"

I laughed and asked how he suddenly became a fragrance expert.

He said it was the new assistant, the one named Maya Henderson.

She was so clumsy she dropped a perfume bottle, and the whole office smelled like it.

He didn't know anything about perfumes, but the others said it was jasmine.

Then he sighed, complaining that new hires were a pain and took too much time to train.

He said he wished I was still working at the company because we made such a great team.

Smiling, I offered to come back and help now that our daughter was older.

He immediately shook his head, playing the doting husband, claiming he couldn't bear to see me work that hard.

I thought it was just a harmless blip, nothing worth stressing over.

But later, Maya's name was constantly on his lips.

No matter what he was doing at home, something always reminded him of her.

I would ask him what he wanted for a late-night snack, and he'd complain that Maya was immature, that she insisted on going shot-for-shot with clients, got blackout drunk, and passed out in his car.

That was why he was late.

I would brew him a pot of coffee, and he'd tell me how Maya accidentally ruined a thousand-dollar espresso machine and went pale with fright.

He told her it was fine, but she stubbornly insisted on paying for it out of her paycheck.

I would ask his opinion on my new lipstick shade, and he'd mention how Maya was jealous of another assistant's makeup skills but was too clumsy to learn it herself.

He said she looked perfectly fine barefaced, yet she was secretly crying alone in his private lounge over it.

It was always like this.

Whenever Jameson brought Maya up, it was always with this mix of exasperation and feigned annoyance.

"I'm firing her tomorrow" practically became his catchphrase.

But then, one day, she completely vanished from his vocabulary.

Just as I was starting to wonder if he had actually fired her, I dropped by his office to run an errand.

And there, in his private suite, I saw a girl taking a nap in a silk slip dress.

I didn't know why, but even without an introduction, my gut instantly told me this was Maya Henderson.

When Jameson rushed in, looking panicked, the girl put on a stubborn face.

"I was just having horrible cramps. I had no choice but to rest in here," she declared. "There is absolutely nothing going on between Mr. Cole and me.

"Mrs. Cole, a woman like you, who coasted into a life of luxury just by having a kid, could never understand how hard us working-class people have it.

"Mr. Cole built this massive company from the ground up. He knows what hard work is, so he gets us.

"He felt sorry for me and let me rest here. You're not my boss, so I don't owe you any explanations. I'd appreciate it if you watched your mouth!"

By then, I had pretty much figured out what this girl's angle was.

I also gathered from her little speech that, at least so far, nothing physical had happened between her and Jameson.

Still, I was shaking with rage. I looked at her and asked, "What exactly did I say that was out of line?"

Maya suddenly shrank back, muttering in a pitifully wronged whisper, "You know exactly what you said. It's disgusting."

I looked at Jameson, fully expecting him to reprimand his disrespectful, boundary-crossing subordinate.

Or at the very least, realize he had crossed a line and offer me some sort of explanation.

But there was nothing. Absolutely nothing.

He just frowned, looking at Maya with disapproval, though his tone betrayed an unmistakable undercurrent of indulgence and pampering.

"You're standing barefoot on the cold floor. Do your cramps magically not hurt anymore?" he said softly. "Get back in bed and rest.

"Is the heating pad still warm? Get in, I'll bring you a fresh one in a minute."

With that, he grabbed my arm and dragged me out of the suite.

His voice carried an impatience he probably didn't even notice himself. "Why are you here? Why are you giving a young girl a hard time over period cramps?

"Just because you aren't a twenty-something anymore doesn't mean you've forgotten how much it hurts, right?"

I stood there paralyzed.

Knee-jerk reactions always reveal a person's true thoughts.

And I never, in a million years, expected those words to come out of Jameson's mouth.

We were high school sweethearts.

We started dating because, during gym class one day, I was pale and doubled over from period cramps.

He was the one who carried me to the nurse's office. He was the one who handed me a cup of hot water when I got back to the classroom.

That was how we connected.

Later, when we got together, he was always so hyper-aware of it.

Every time I had bad cramps, he would treat it like a major crisis.

Even after I had our daughter and my body recovered to the point where the pain was manageable, he would still shower me with extra care during those few days of the month.

Yet now, he could say something so cruel to me, just to reserve that exact same care for another woman.

For a split second, I didn't even know what expression to make. What reaction to have.

I just let him drag me along in a daze, taking a long time to finally snap out of it.

The moment I did, I slapped Jameson across the face.

I asked, "Do you have feelings for her?"

"No!" he denied it instantly, almost as if he had the answer rehearsed.

"Then... do you know she has feelings for you?"

This time, it took Jameson a long while to answer. "It's not what you think. She's had a rough life, and I can't just fire her over something like this.

"Nothing is ever going to happen between us. You have to trust me."

"So you do know," I said, my voice feeling hollow and weightless.

Jameson kept his head down and didn't say another word.