Chapter 1

I found out my husband had been keeping his first love in a penthouse across town when she posted a sonogram on Instagram—tagged him as "Daddy."

We'd been married for two years. A contract marriage, yes—but he'd promised me exclusivity.

Liam Crawford, CEO of Crawford Industries, had married me to secure a merger with my father's company. No love, no pretense—just signatures and a shared address. But somewhere between the cold contract and the quiet dinners, I'd made the catastrophic mistake of falling for him.

Now I was staring at Sienna Blake's Instagram story: a perfectly manicured hand resting on a baby bump, a Cartier bracelet on her wrist—the same bracelet I'd picked out for myself last month and Liam said was "out of stock."

The caption read: Some things are worth the wait. 💕

Three hundred comments. Half of them tagging Liam. Half of them calling her "Mrs. Crawford."

My hands were steady as I screenshot everything. Then I called him.

He picked up on the fourth ring, his voice low and irritated. "Aurelia, I'm in a meeting."

"Are you funding Sienna Blake's pregnancy?"

Silence. Then: "Who told you that?"

Not a denial. Not even a pause to pretend.

"Instagram told me. Along with about ten thousand of your closest friends."

"It's not what you think." His voice dropped, controlled, the way it got when he was managing a hostile board. "Sienna and I have history, you know that. She wanted a child. I agreed to help—it was IVF, nothing happened between us."

"You told me you didn't want children," I said quietly. "You made me sign a clause."

Clause 7B of our marriage contract: No children shall be conceived during the term of this agreement. He'd insisted. Said children complicated things, that he wasn't built for fatherhood, that the marriage was purely strategic.

I'd agreed because I wanted the marriage badly enough to agree to anything.

"That clause was to protect you," Liam said smoothly. "Pregnancy would've put your body through unnecessary risk during the merger period—"

"Stop." My voice didn't waver. "You put a no-pregnancy clause in our contract, then got another woman pregnant. There's no version of this where you're the good guy."

"Aurelia—"

I hung up.

My fingers moved on autopilot, pulling up the prenuptial agreement on my laptop. Section 12: Dissolution. I knew every line. I'd helped draft it—I was a corporate attorney before I became Liam Crawford's decorative wife.

Twenty minutes later, I'd emailed my lawyer.

Forty minutes later, Liam's Maybach pulled into the driveway.

He walked in looking like he'd aged five years—tie loosened, jaw tight, dark circles betraying him. But his first words weren't an apology.

"Did you leave a comment on Sienna's post?"

I had. A single line: Congratulations. I hope he's more honest with you than he was with me.

"Delete it," he said. "You're embarrassing her."

I laughed. The sound was hollow, even to my own ears. "I'm embarrassing her?"

"She's fragile right now, Aurelia. She's six months along and her blood pressure is already high. She doesn't need your passive-aggressive—"

"And what do I need, Liam?" I stood up, meeting his eyes. "What exactly have I needed for two years while you kept her in a penthouse twelve blocks from our home?"

He reached for my hand. I stepped back.

"I want a divorce," I said.

"No."

The word hit the air like a gunshot.

"The merger isn't finalized," he said, his jaw clenching. "You file now, and both our families lose everything. Is that what you want?"

"What I want," I said slowly, "is to stop being the woman you settled for."

His expression flickered—Loss? Guilt? I couldn't tell anymore.

"Give me three months," he said. "After the merger closes, we'll discuss terms."

"There's nothing to discuss."

"Three months, Aurelia. You owe me that."

I didn't owe him a single breath. But the merger involved my father's company, my family's legacy, and four thousand employees who had nothing to do with Liam Crawford's lies.

So I looked at the man I'd loved in silence for two years and said the words that would haunt us both:

"Three months. Not a day more. And if Sienna Blake contacts me even once—I'll burn this whole arrangement to the ground."

Liam nodded, relief briefly crossing his face before he masked it.

He had no idea what was coming.