Chapter 2

The pain split through me like lightning, and for a moment, I forgot about Dominic, about Vanessa, about everything.

I gripped the counter, gasping. No. This couldn't be happening. I was only thirty-four weeks. The baby wasn't due for another six weeks.

Another contraction seized me, sharper this time, and I nearly collapsed. My water broke right there on the kitchen floor of the Ashford penthouse — the pristine Italian marble now slick beneath my feet.

I fumbled for my phone with shaking hands and called Dominic.

It rang once. Twice. Three times.

Voicemail.

I called again.

Voicemail.

A third time, my fingers barely able to hold the phone through the pain.

"You've reached Dominic Ashford. Leave a message."

"Dominic—" My voice cracked. "I'm — something's wrong. The baby. Please come home. Please—"

The line beeped, cutting me off.

I called his driver, Marco. No answer.

I called the Ashford estate. The housekeeper picked up.

"Mrs. Ashford? Mr. Dominic left strict instructions not to be disturbed tonight. He's at a private—"

"I'm in labor!" I screamed, the pain making my vision white. "Call him! Call an ambulance! Call anyone!"

The next forty minutes were a blur — the ambulance, the paramedics strapping me in, the fluorescent lights of the hospital ceiling passing overhead like a nightmare film reel. I kept checking my phone between contractions.

Nothing from Dominic.

In the delivery room, the doctor's face was grim. "The baby's in distress. We may need an emergency C-section."

"My husband," I gasped. "He's coming. Please wait—"

"Mrs. Ashford, we can't wait."

The nurse beside me squeezed my hand — a stranger's kindness where my husband's should have been.

"Is there someone else we should call?" she asked gently.

Someone else.

I had no one. My mother was bedridden across the country. My father had been dead for six years. I had no friends in this city — Dominic's world had swallowed my old life whole, leaving nothing behind.

"No," I whispered. "There's no one."

At 11:47 PM on our second wedding anniversary, I gave birth to a four-pound, two-ounce baby girl.

She was so small. So terrifyingly small. They placed her on my chest for exactly twelve seconds before rushing her to the NICU, her tiny body connected to wires and monitors that beeped in rhythms I didn't understand.

I lay there, hollowed out, staring at the ceiling.

My phone lit up. Finally.

Dominic: Just saw your messages. Is everything alright?

11:52 PM. Five minutes after his daughter was born.

I read the message through a haze of exhaustion and something darker — something that had been building for months and had now, in this sterile room that smelled of antiseptic and loneliness, finally solidified into certainty.

I typed my response slowly, each word deliberate:

Elena: I had the baby. She's in the NICU. Don't come.

His reply was instant: What? Elena, I'm on my way—

Elena: I said don't come.

Then I turned off my phone, placed it on the bedside table, and closed my eyes.

For the first time in two years, I didn't wait for Dominic Ashford.

And I never would again.