Chapter 4

"I won't sign it," I said softly, looking up at him with a docile, helpless expression. "I don't care about shares or money, Julian. I just want to stay by your side."

Julian froze. His smug, expectant smile vanished, replaced by an unsettling flicker of guilt and hesitation.

"Nora... look, I..."

"I'm exhausted, Julian. I'm going to lie down."

I tapped my white cane across the hardwood floor, carefully navigating my way into the guest bedroom without looking at him.

Heavy footsteps lingered outside my door for a moment before retreating down the hall.

He had let his guard down. He felt guilty.

I let out a cold, silent scoff.

Did they really think I was a pathetic sheep ready for slaughter? Did Julian Hayes honestly believe I was that weak?

I pulled out my phone and ordered high-definition pinhole cameras online, having them delivered via priority courier. Within hours, I had them hidden in every strategic corner of the penthouse.

Next, I reached out to industry contacts to dig into Hayes Enterprises' upcoming schedule.

Their biggest product launch of the decade—the one Julian had spent millions hyping up—was scheduled for this coming Sunday.

Julian had always kept me out of the corporate loop under the guise of "protecting" me. But my inquiries revealed something far more repulsive:

Chloe Jenkins had already established herself as the de facto "First Lady" of Hayes Enterprises, throwing her weight around the executive floor like she owned the place.

That evening, Chloe came barging into our home in a foul mood, stripping off her blazer the second she stepped through the door.

Julian, still haunted by my words from earlier, pushed her away.

"Julian, what the hell is your problem?!" Chloe whined, wrapping her arms around his neck. "All she has to do is sign that paper, and we can finally be together out in the open!"

"She's blind! She doesn't even know it's a real divorce!"

"If you really feel that bad for the pathetic cripple, you can just keep her as a side piece in some cheap apartment. It won't hurt anybody..."

She kept rambling, but Julian looked torn. He hadn't actually prepared himself to discard me so ruthlessly.

Seeing his hesitation, Chloe pulled him down by his tie and mashed her lips against his.

Her practiced seduction quickly shattered Julian’s fragile guilt. In seconds, they were tearing each other's clothes off, completely forgetting there was another living soul under this roof.

Inside my dark bedroom, I watched the crisp, full-HD stream on my tablet screen. Two naked bodies tangled on the living room rug like animals.

A razor-sharp smirk tugged at my lips.

Afterward, Chloe tried to strut into my bedroom to take a shower. Julian grabbed her arm.

"Stop it. She's in there. Don't push your luck."

Furious at being told no, Chloe kicked my bedroom door wide open, marching in with her hand raised, ready to slap me awake.

Before her hand could descend, I swung my heavy wooden cane with all my strength, pretending to blindly swat at an unknown noise.

CRACK!

The solid wood smashed squarely across the bridge of her nose.

A blood-curdling shriek tore from Chloe's throat. Blood and snot instantly smeared across her face as she dropped to her knees, wailing like a banshee.

"Julian! Look at this blind bitch! She hit me! Are you going to let her abuse me like this?!"

This was barely a scratch, and she was already losing her mind?

Oh, sweet Chloe. The real show hasn't even started.

Once the fragile illusion was broken, Chloe shed all pretense, treating our marital penthouse as her personal playground.

I quietly gathered the pristine video recordings, backed them up across three cloud drives, and placed them neatly alongside the forged divorce agreement.

Sunday arrived. The Grand Ballroom at the Ritz-Carlton was packed with tech moguls, investors, and elite media outlets for Hayes Enterprises' flagship launch.

As Julian’s "executive assistant" and public muse, Chloe took center stage to host the keynote.

Near the end of the presentation, during the press Q&A, an entertainment reporter chimed in with a grin:

"Ms. Jenkins, word on the street is that you are Mr. Hayes' secretly wedded wife! You two make such a stunning power couple!"

Flushed with vanity under the blinding stage lights, Chloe blushed coyly into the mic.

"Well... since the cat's out of the bag, I suppose there's no point in hiding our love anymore..."

BANG!

A sharp electrical pop echoed through the hall, and the stage lights plunged into pitch darkness.

Before Chloe could bark an order at the stage crew, a sickeningly familiar, guttural moan blasted through the multi-thousand-dollar surround sound speakers.

Chloe’s eyes bulged with horror as she whipped around toward the massive LED screen behind her. The microphone slipped from her fingers, clattering loudly against the stage.

The entire ballroom erupted into an uproar. Every man in the room leaned forward, their eyes glued to the display.

Spanning eighty feet across the screen in crystal-clear 4K resolution was the video of Julian Hayes and Chloe Jenkins, naked as the day they were born, writhing on our living room rug.

Chloe was riding him aggressively, her voice echoing through the hall:

"Are you ever going to divorce that blind bitch Nora, or do you expect me to be your dirty little secret forever?"

"It's either me or her, Julian. Choose right now..."

Bedlam broke loose. Chloe’s knees gave out, and she collapsed onto the stage, clawing at her hair, screeching like a lunatic.

"Turn it off! That's fake! It's an AI deepfake! Who the fuck did this?!"

I rose gracefully from my seat in the front row, walking down the darkened center aisle with steady, confident steps.

I stepped onto the stage, picked up the microphone from the floor, and faced the sea of flashing cameras.

"Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen. Welcome to the Hayes Enterprises product launch. I am Nora Vance, Julian Hayes' legal wife of three years."

The room practically exploded.

In the dead silence that followed, Julian leapt to his feet from the VIP table. His handsome face was twisted into a grotesque mask of sheer terror.

"Nora?! You... When did your eyes...?"

"You're joking... This is a sick joke, right?!"