Gracet Molly Szczerba

I signed the rejection papers while my mate kissed another woman on our bed. The pen didn't even shake in my hand. Three years of marriage—and this was how it ended. Not with a fight. Not with tears. Just the quiet scratch of ink on paper while she moaned his name in the next room. I placed the signed documents on the kitchen counter, right next to the breakfast I'd made him—his favorite, eggs Benedict with smoked salmon. The plate was still warm. Then I picked up my bag and walked toward the door. I didn't slam it. I closed it gently, the way I'd done everything in this marriage—quietly, carefully, making sure I never disturbed anyone. The morning air hit my face. Cold. Sharp. January in New York. My wolf stirred inside me, weak but restless. *"We need to tell him,"* she whispered. I pressed my hand against my stomach—still flat, but not for long. Six weeks pregnant. With the child of an Alpha who just rejected me for his childhood sweetheart. No. He didn't need to know. He'd made his choice. And I'd made mine. I pulled out my phone and dialed the only number I had left. "Aunt Harper? It's Elara." "Elara? Oh my God, sweetheart—what's wrong? It's six in the morning." "I need a place to stay. Can I come to you?" A pause. Then, softly: "What did he do?" My throat tightened. I wanted to be strong. I wanted to sound unbothered. But when someone asks you *what happened* with genuine care in their voice—after three years of no one asking at all—something inside you just... breaks. "He chose her," I whispered. "He's been choosing her for months. I just... I didn't want to see it." "I'm booking your train ticket right now. Don't argue." "Okay." "And Elara?" "Yeah?" "You're never going back to that man. Do you hear me?" I ended the call and stood on the sidewalk, watching the city wake up around me. Somewhere behind me, in the penthouse I'd called home for three years, my husband—no, my *ex*-husband—was tangled in sheets with Megan Cross, the woman he told me was "just a colleague." Funny thing was, I'd believed him. Every single time. When she called at midnight, I believed him. When her perfume clung to his collar, I believed him. When she showed up at our anniversary dinner "by coincidence," I smiled and offered her a seat. Because that's what Luna Elara did. She trusted. She forgave. She stayed. But Luna Elara was gone now. My phone buzzed. Aunt Harper had sent the ticket. The train left in two hours. I didn't look back—not once. But my wolf did. And the last thing she felt through the bond, before I shut it down completely, was this: He was laughing. He was laughing with her in our bed—and he hadn't even noticed I was gone.

To prove my husband loved me, I died on our kitchen floor for four minutes. He didn't call 911. He called his mother to ask what to do about the "mess." It was Thanksgiving. I'd spent fourteen hours cooking for his family—his mother Gloria, his sister Pamela, his brother-in-law, their three kids. A feast for twelve. I'd been bleeding internally for two days from the miscarriage I hadn't told anyone about yet, because Liam said his mother's holiday "couldn't be ruined by drama." So I cooked. I bled. I smiled. When I collapsed face-first into the mashed potatoes, Liam didn't even stand up. "She's faking it," Gloria said, cutting her turkey. "She always has to make everything about herself." Pamela laughed. My heart stopped beating sixty seconds later. It was Gloria's youngest grandchild, a six-year-old named Chloe, who screamed loud enough to make Liam finally check my pulse. "Mom," he said into his phone—not 911, his mother, who was sitting eight feet away—"I think something's actually wrong." Gloria sighed, set down her fork, and said, "Well, move her off the table. She's ruining the cranberry sauce." The paramedics told me later that I was dead for four minutes. Four minutes where my husband stood over my body and asked his mother for permission to care. I woke up in the hospital alone. No flowers. No husband. A text from Liam that read: "Mom's upset. You embarrassed her in front of the family. We need to talk about your behavior." I stared at that text for a long time. Then I deleted it, along with every photo of our wedding, every memory of the girl who believed Liam Ashford would protect her. That girl died on the kitchen floor. She didn't come back. I did. Three years later, I was the most successful personal injury attorney in Chicago. I'd won cases against hospitals, corporations, and once, a sitting senator. I was feared in courtrooms and respected in boardrooms. And I had just been seated, at the worst possible charity gala, directly across from Liam Ashford and his mother Gloria. Gloria, who now needed something from me. Because I was representing the woman suing her family's company for wrongful death. Liam looked at me like he'd seen a ghost. Which, technically, he had. "Audrey?" His voice cracked. "You look—" "Alive?" I offered. "Surprising, right? Given that the last time you saw me, I was dead on your mother's dinner table and you were worried about the cranberry sauce." Gloria's smile could have frozen hell. "Audrey, darling. Let's not be dramatic. It was a medical episode. We handled it." "You handled it," I repeated slowly, "by telling your son not to call an ambulance because it would 'cause a scene.'" The table went silent. Gloria's lawyer leaned over and whispered something in her ear. Her face went white. Because she had just realized something I'd known for three years: I wasn't here to forgive. I was here to dismantle her family, brick by brick, in open court. And I had every single receipt. Liam reached for my hand under the table. "Audrey, please. I've changed. I left her. I left my mother's company. I've been trying to find you—" I pulled my hand away and smiled. "You'll find me Monday morning, Liam. In court. Opposing counsel table." His face crumbled. Gloria's wine glass shattered in her grip. And across the room, a woman I hadn't noticed before—young, pregnant, terrified—caught my eye and mouthed two words: Help me. She was wearing a bruise on her wrist shaped exactly like a man's hand. And she was sitting next to Liam's younger brother, the one I'd never met. The one Gloria had always called "the good son."

I satisfying satisfying satisfying caught my husband satisfying satisfying — let me start over. I caught my husband checking into the Ritz with another woman on our third wedding anniversary. Instead of crying, I smiled. Because that satisfying satisfying — okay, here's what actually happened. I caught my husband, Drake, checking into the Ritz-Carlton with a woman in a red dress on our third wedding anniversary. He told me he had a "client dinner." I was parked right across the street, watching him wrap his arm around her waist like she was made of glass. I didn't cry. I didn't scream. I took a photo and sent it to my lawyer. Then I walked into the lobby. The receptionist recognized me immediately. Of course she did. My family owned the hotel. "Mrs. Ashford! What a lovely surprise. Are you here for—" "Which room did my husband just check into?" She went pale. "Suite 1207, ma'am." I took the elevator up, heels clicking on marble. My heart was steady. Three years of suspicion, three years of being called "paranoid" and "insecure"—it all led to this door. I knocked. Drake opened it in a bathrobe, and his face collapsed like a building demolition. "Natalie? What—how—" I looked past him. The woman was sitting on the bed in lingerie, sipping champagne. When she saw me, she didn't flinch. She actually smiled. "So you're the wife." She crossed her legs. "He said you were plain. He wasn't wrong." My blood went cold. Drake grabbed my arm. "Babe, it's not what it looks like. She's a colleague. We were just—" "In a suite. In bathrobes. On our anniversary." "Let me explain—" The woman stood up and walked toward me. She was tall, gorgeous, dripping with confidence she hadn't earned. "Honey, let me save you the trouble," she said. "Drake and I have been together for a year. He's going to divorce you. He just hasn't found the right time to tell you." She put her hand on Drake's chest. "Right, baby?" Drake's eyes darted between us like a trapped animal. "Is that true?" I asked him. He swallowed hard. "Natalie, you don't understand. Victoria comes from a powerful family. Her father is the CEO of Thornton Group. She can help my career in ways you never could." "You're a good wife," he added, like that was supposed to soften the blow. "But you're just... ordinary." Ordinary. I almost laughed. For three years, I had played the role of a simple, supportive wife. I cooked his meals. I ironed his shirts. I drove a Honda while my actual car collection sat in a private garage. He had no idea that the company he worked for? The one he was so desperate to climb the ladder in? I owned it. Every single share. Victoria flipped her hair. "Look, I don't want to be cruel, but Drake deserves someone on his level. Someone with connections, money, status. You're sweet, but you're out of your league." I looked at Drake one final time. "You want a divorce?" He hesitated, then nodded slowly. "I think it's for the best." "Perfect." I pulled out my phone. "I'll have the papers ready by morning." His jaw dropped. He clearly hadn't expected me to agree so easily. As I turned to leave, Victoria called out, "Don't forget to find yourself a good lawyer, sweetie. You'll need one." I paused at the door and smiled over my shoulder. "Oh, I don't think I'm the one who'll need a lawyer." They had no idea what was coming.

I signed the rejection papers while my mate kissed another woman on our bed. The pen didn't even shake in my hand. Three years of marriage—and this was how it ended. Not with a fight. Not with tears. Just the quiet scratch of ink on paper while she moaned his name in the next room. I placed the signed documents on the kitchen counter, right next to the breakfast I'd made him—his favorite, eggs Benedict with smoked salmon. The plate was still warm. Then I picked up my bag and walked toward the door. I didn't slam it. I closed it gently, the way I'd done everything in this marriage—quietly, carefully, making sure I never disturbed anyone. The morning air hit my face. Cold. Sharp. January in New York. My wolf stirred inside me, weak but restless. *"We need to tell him,"* she whispered. I pressed my hand against my stomach—still flat, but not for long. Six weeks pregnant. With the child of an Alpha who just rejected me for his childhood sweetheart. No. He didn't need to know. He'd made his choice. And I'd made mine. I pulled out my phone and dialed the only number I had left. "Aunt Harper? It's Elara." "Elara? Oh my God, sweetheart—what's wrong? It's six in the morning." "I need a place to stay. Can I come to you?" A pause. Then, softly: "What did he do?" My throat tightened. I wanted to be strong. I wanted to sound unbothered. But when someone asks you *what happened* with genuine care in their voice—after three years of no one asking at all—something inside you just... breaks. "He chose her," I whispered. "He's been choosing her for months. I just... I didn't want to see it." "I'm booking your train ticket right now. Don't argue." "Okay." "And Elara?" "Yeah?" "You're never going back to that man. Do you hear me?" I ended the call and stood on the sidewalk, watching the city wake up around me. Somewhere behind me, in the penthouse I'd called home for three years, my husband—no, my *ex*-husband—was tangled in sheets with Megan Cross, the woman he told me was "just a colleague." Funny thing was, I'd believed him. Every single time. When she called at midnight, I believed him. When her perfume clung to his collar, I believed him. When she showed up at our anniversary dinner "by coincidence," I smiled and offered her a seat. Because that's what Luna Elara did. She trusted. She forgave. She stayed. But Luna Elara was gone now. My phone buzzed. Aunt Harper had sent the ticket. The train left in two hours. I didn't look back—not once. But my wolf did. And the last thing she felt through the bond, before I shut it down completely, was this: He was laughing. He was laughing with her in our bed—and he hadn't even noticed I was gone.

The pregnancy test showed two lines. I was twelve weeks along. I clutched the ultrasound photo, tears streaming down my face as I rushed to my husband's office at Blackwell Enterprises to surprise him. Ethan Blackwell — CEO, billionaire, the man every woman in this city wanted. And he was mine. Or so I thought. His secretary, Diane, tried to stop me. "Mrs. Blackwell, he's in a meeting—" I pushed past her. I was his wife. I didn't need an appointment. But when I opened the door, there was no meeting. Ethan had his mistress bent over his desk. Her red hair spilled across the mahogany surface. His hand gripped her hip. Her moans filled the room like she owned it. And the woman — I knew her face. Jessica Langley. My stepsister. The ultrasound photo slipped from my fingers. Ethan saw me first. He didn't even flinch. He straightened his tie, looking at me like I was an employee who'd walked in without knocking. "Vivienne. I told Diane no interruptions." No shock. No guilt. Not even the decency to pull away from her. Jessica turned around slowly, smoothing her skirt. She looked at the ultrasound on the floor, then at me, and smiled. "Oh, sis. You really should learn to knock." My chest was caving in. I couldn't breathe. "Ethan… I'm pregnant." The words came out broken. Desperate. Pathetic. Something flickered in his eyes. Not joy. Not surprise. Annoyance. "We'll discuss this later, Vivienne." Jessica picked up the ultrasound, studying it with mock tenderness. "Twelve weeks? How sweet." She glanced at Ethan. "Should I tell her, or will you?" "Tell me what?" Ethan's jaw tightened. He buttoned his cuff, not looking at me. "Jessica is also pregnant. Fourteen weeks." The floor tilted beneath me. "She's carrying the Blackwell heir," he continued, his voice flat, clinical, like he was reading a quarterly report. "My mother already knows. The family has accepted it." I staggered backward. "And what about our baby?" "Get rid of it." Three words. He said them the way you'd cancel a dinner reservation. Jessica walked toward me, pressing the ultrasound photo back into my trembling hands. "Don't worry, sis. I'll take good care of your husband." That was the moment I should have left. In my previous life, I didn't. In my previous life, I begged. I crawled. I stayed in that marriage for four more months, trying to save it, trying to make him love me again. Until Jessica pushed me down the stairs at the Blackwell estate. I lost the baby. I lost three liters of blood on the marble floor. And Ethan? He was at a charity gala with Jessica, accepting an award for "Family Values in Business." I bled out alone. The housekeeper found my body the next morning. But now — I opened my eyes, and I was standing in his office doorway again. The ultrasound photo was still in my hand. Jessica was still bent over the desk. And this time, I didn't cry. I picked up the photo, tucked it into my pocket, and looked at my husband with the clearest eyes I'd ever had. "You want me to get rid of it?" I smiled. "Fine. But I'm getting rid of you first." Ethan blinked. For the first time in our marriage, I saw confusion on his face. Good. Let him be confused. Because in this life, Vivienne Ashford doesn't beg. She burns it all down.

The pregnancy test showed two pink lines the same morning I found my husband's secretary's red lingerie stuffed between our couch cushions. I was still holding both—the test in my right hand, the lace thong in my left—when Derek walked through the front door with roses. Not for me. He didn't even notice me standing in the living room. He was too busy on the phone, laughing softly. "I know, Megan. I'll tell her tonight. Just give me a little more time..." He froze when he saw me. His eyes darted to the lingerie, then to the pregnancy test, then back to my face. "It's not what you think, Olivia," he said automatically. I almost laughed. Seven years of marriage, and that was the best he could come up with. "Whose are these?" I held up the red thong. Derek set the roses on the counter—roses I now realized were never meant for me—and loosened his tie. "Megan left some gym clothes here after the work dinner last week. You're overreacting." "Gym clothes." I repeated it flatly. "A lace thong is gym clothes." "You're always twisting everything." His voice shifted—that familiar, condescending tone he'd perfected over the years. "You know what your problem is, Olivia? You're paranoid. You sit home all day with nothing to do, so you invent problems." I held up the pregnancy test. The color drained from his face. "I'm pregnant, Derek." For exactly three seconds, something flickered in his eyes—surprise, maybe even joy. Then his phone buzzed, and whatever it was disappeared. He glanced at the screen and typed a quick reply before looking back at me. "We'll talk about this later. I have to handle something at the office." "It's nine PM." "Olivia." His jaw tightened. "I said we'll talk later." He grabbed his car keys and walked out. The roses sat on the counter, mocking me. I picked up the card tucked inside. "To my Megan—you're the only thing that makes my days worth living. —D" My hands were shaking. Not from sadness—I was past that. I was shaking from the realization that I'd wasted seven years of my life on a man who wrote love notes to another woman while his wife carried his child. I sank onto the couch and pressed my hand against my stomach. That's when his mother called. Eleanor Grant—the one person in Derek's family who had always treated me like a daughter. She'd been battling cancer for two years. I visited her every single day at the care facility, held her hand, read to her, made sure she ate. Derek hadn't visited in three months. "Olivia, sweetheart," Eleanor's voice was frail. "I need to ask you something important. Can you come see me tomorrow?" "Of course, Mom. Anything." She paused, then said quietly, "I'm changing my will. I'm leaving everything to you." I sat up straight. "What?" "The company shares. The properties. All of it. Derek doesn't deserve a cent—I know what he's been doing behind your back." Her voice cracked. "I raised him better than this. I'm so sorry, sweetheart." Before I could respond, I heard the front door open again. Derek was back. But he wasn't alone. Standing behind him, still in her work blouse with her lipstick freshly reapplied, was Megan. And she was smiling at me. "Olivia," Derek said, without a trace of shame, "Megan's going to be staying in the guest room for a few days. Her apartment is being fumigated."

The first thing I heard when I woke up in the hospital was my husband telling the doctor to pull the plug. "She has no family. No one will ask questions." Adrian's voice was calm. Bored, even. The same voice he used to order wine. "Make it look like the heart gave out." I couldn't move. The drugs they'd pumped into me locked my body in place, but my mind screamed inside its cage. I'm awake. I'm right here. I can hear you. "And the prenup?" A second voice. Female. Sweet as poisoned sugar. Celeste. My sister. My maid of honor. The woman who'd cried at my wedding three years ago and toasted to "forever." "Voided the second she flatlines," Adrian said. "Everything transfers to me. Then to you, darling. Patience." Darling. Three years. Three years I'd given that man everything—my trust fund, my father's company, my whole stupid heart. Three years I'd ignored the bruises on my wrists, the "accidents," the way he flinched away from my touch like I disgusted him. I'd told myself love was hard. That marriage was work. I hadn't told myself the truth: that I was being murdered slowly, one quiet poison at a time. A tear slid down my cheek and pooled in my ear. I couldn't even wipe it. "She's crying," Celeste whispered, and for one insane moment I thought she'd save me. My little sister. The girl I'd raised after Mom died, whose tuition I'd paid, whose heartbreaks I'd nursed at 3 a.m. She leaned close. I felt her breath on my face. "Don't worry, Lena," she cooed. "I'll take such good care of him. And the money. You always did share so well." Then she laughed. That laugh broke something in me that the bruises never could. The doctor adjusted my IV. I felt the cold creep up my arm, a different cold than the others, a final cold, and I understood with perfect clarity that I was about to die in a room full of the people I loved most, and not one of them would mourn me. No. The word rose from somewhere deeper than fear, deeper than the drugs, deeper than three years of swallowed screams. Not like this. My finger twitched. No one noticed. They were already talking about the funeral flowers. But I noticed. And in that single twitch—that one rebellious inch of movement they thought they'd stolen—I made a promise to the woman dying on that table. I am going to live. And then I am going to make every single one of them wish they'd finished the job. The cold reached my heart. And the monitor went flat.

I went into labor on the marble floor of the Moretti mansion while my husband toasted his mistress three rooms away. I called him eleven times. He silenced every single one. On the twelfth, his first love—Sofia—answered. "Elena, stop. Dante's busy. Sofia just collapsed in his arms. Have some decency." She hung up before I could scream that my water had broken, that his son was coming two months early, that I was bleeding on the imported stone he loved more than me. I dragged myself toward the grand staircase. Down below, the gala roared—two hundred guests in black tie, champagne towers, violins. All to honor Dante Moretti, the youngest don to ever rule the Eastern Syndicate, a man feared from the docks of New York to the vaults of Sicily. My husband. The man who hadn't touched me in five months because Sofia Russo had "come home broken" and needed him to put her back together. I clawed my way to the top of the staircase and looked down. There he was. His hand cradling Sofia's cheek as she swayed against his chest in a blood-red gown, eyes closed, lips parted like a woman in a dream. She looked like a queen. She looked like his wife. I was his wife. A contraction tore through me so hard I crumpled against the banister. "Dante!" I screamed. The orchestra swallowed it whole. It was his mother, Isabella, who finally saw me. But she didn't run. She climbed the stairs and seized my wrist, nails like talons. "What are you doing? Crawling around like an animal at my son's celebration?" "The baby," I gasped. "He's coming—" "You trapped my son with that belly. Don't think I'm blind." Her grip twisted. "Sofia nearly died tonight. Crawl back to your room before you shame this family further." She let go. She walked away. Forty minutes later, a kitchen maid found me unconscious in a spreading pool of red and called for the family doctor. I delivered my son by emergency cesarean—alone. A boy. Premature. Fragile. Alive. When I opened my eyes, the room was empty except for the soft beep of a monitor and the smallest cry I'd ever heard. I checked my phone. One message from Dante, sent four hours after the maid had told him. [Heard you made a scene. Theatrical, even for you. Sofia relapsed after your stunt. I'm staying with her. We'll speak when you've calmed down.] I read it until the words dissolved. Then I typed three words. [I want out.] He read it instantly. His reply came in three seconds. [Good. I was waiting for you to say it.]