Chapter 3

I looked at her, the woman I'd shared a bed with for three years, and for the first time, she felt like a stranger.

Her face said it all: shock, disbelief, and above all, the panic of someone whose secret had just been exposed.

"Anabella, so your so-called investment was just handing over our family's emergency fund to a guy everyone in the business knows is a scammer?" I said, my voice thick with disbelief.

"He's not a scammer!" Anabella screamed, her voice sharp with emotion. "Braylon isn't! He's just unlucky! He's talented, he has dreams! People like you, so shallow, could never get it!"

"I don't get it?" I let out a cold laugh. "All I know is the money I busted my back for is gone, thanks to you and your stupidity! Gold's at eight hundred right now. We could've had 400 thousand dollars! But now? We're drowning in debt!"

"Money! Money! Money! That's all you ever care about!" Anabella's tears fell in big, heavy drops, like a broken string of pearls. "Isn't there any value in dreams or passion in your eyes?"

"Dreams? Passion?" I strode up to her, looking down from above. "So your Mr. Perfect's dreams have to be paid for with my sweat and blood? Anabella, do you really think Arthur is that easy to walk all over?"

My presence made her flinch, and she instinctively backed away until her back hit the cold wall. She was cornered.

"I... I didn't..." Anabella stammered, her voice trembling as she tried to defend herself. "I just wanted to help him. I never thought things would end up like this..."

"You never thought?" I grabbed her chin, forcing her to look me in the eye. "Did you even think to ask me before you sold off the gold? Did you ever think about me when you sent 400 thousand dollars to that man? Or did you just think, since it was my money, it didn't matter if you wasted it all?"

I tightened my grip, and pain flickered across her face.

"No... Arthur, you're hurting me..." she pleaded.

"Hurts? Now you finally know what pain feels like?" I shoved her face away, disgust boiling inside me. "My heart aches a thousand times worse than yours ever could!"

I turned and headed back to the living room, pulled out a pen and some paper from the drawer, and tossed them onto the coffee table.

"Write everything down. Every detail, how much you got for the gold, how you sent the money to Braylon, all of it. Then sign your name at the bottom."

Anabella froze, staring at me in confusion. "What's the point of this?"

"What for? It's evidence," I said, my face cold. "Anabella, this was all your doing during our marriage, and you blew the money without asking me, leaving us in a financial mess. When we split, this debt is all on you."

"Divorce?" Anabella echoed.

She looked like she'd just heard the most unbelievable thing in the world, completely stunned.

She probably never imagined that I, who'd always given in to her every whim, would ever say those words.

"Arthur, you... what did you just say?" she stammered, her voice trembling.

"I said, divorce," I repeated, each word sharp and deliberate. "First thing tomorrow, we're going to the Registry Office."

"No! I don't want a divorce!" Anabella lunged at me, trying to hug me, but I shoved her away in disgust.

She collapsed to the floor, sobbing her heart out. "Arthur, I was wrong. I really was! Please, just give me one more chance, okay? I'll do whatever it takes to get the money back! I promise, I'll make it right!"

"Get it back? How exactly?" I looked at her, the irony almost too much. "You're going to beg your beloved Braylon to cough up the money he already swallowed? Anabella, don't be so naive. Once a professional scammer gets his hands on cash, you really think you'll ever see a penny of it again?"

"I don't care! I'll beg him, I'll get down on my knees if I have to! Just don't leave me!" she wailed, her makeup smeared, looking a total mess.

Back then, just seeing her cry like this would have made me cave every time.

There was a time when her tear-streaked face would always make my heart soften.

But now, looking at her, I didn't feel a thing. If anything, I just felt sick to my stomach.

"It's too late," I said coldly. "Ever since you stole that gold, there was no going back."

I tuned out her sobbing and stormed into the study, slamming and locking the door behind me.

I needed to get my head straight.

I leaned back against the door, my body sliding down until I ended up sitting, defeated, on the cold floor.

Anger, disappointment, betrayal... all of it roiled inside me, scorching my chest.

I thought I'd married someone who'd stick with me through thick and thin, but turns out she was just a leech lurking by my side, ready to bleed me dry to bail out another man.