Chapter 1

Seven months pregnant, and Christian still had me climbing up and down a step stool in the living room, hanging Christmas decorations.

All to welcome his childhood best friend, Chloe, who had just returned from living abroad.

His excuse? "She needs to feel at home."

At the welcome party, Chloe smiled sweetly and handed me a glass of red wine.

"Valerie, a little red wine actually improves your circulation. Pregnant women abroad drink it all the time."

The other guests chimed in, urging me to take the glass. I kept my face cold, shaking my head in refusal.

Chloe’s eyes immediately welled with tears as she tugged on Christian’s sleeve.

"Christian... does she look down on me? Is that why she won't drink it?"

With that single sentence, Christian flipped the dining table.

"Look at yourself—you're bloated like a pig! You sicken me! Who do you think you are, ruining everyone's mood?"

Outside, a blizzard raged. Barefoot, I was shoved out into the freezing snow.

Through the frosted window, I watched Christian pull Chloe into his arms, murmuring softly to comfort her.

"Don't cry. As long as I'm here, no one will ever mistreat you."

"Just wait. I'll make her come back on her knees and beg for your forgiveness."

What he didn't know was that the moment I struggled up from the frozen ground, I called my best friend, Nina, who worked as an OB-GYN.

Shivering violently, the first thing I said when I saw her was:

"Nina, I want to induce labor. I'm terminating the pregnancy."

If anyone wanted to have this bastard's child, they were welcome to it.

Because I was done.

Nina slammed her hands onto her desk.

"I support you a hundred percent!"

"I told you to dump that deadbeat years ago, but you were so head-over-heels you insisted on marrying him. Has the blizzard finally knocked some sense into you?"

I offered a bitter smile, saying nothing.

She scrolled through my prenatal records on her computer, a flicker of hesitation in her eyes.

"You're seven months along, and all your scans have been completely normal. Have you considered just keeping the baby and raising it without him?"

I hesitated for a long time, then shook my head.

"No."

As an expectant mother, tearing this child from my body broke my heart.

Yet the thought of keeping the baby meant tethering myself to Christian forever. Just picturing that endless entanglement felt like an anvil crushing my chest, suffocating me.

Seeing my resolve, Nina printed out the pre-op consent forms and handed them over.

"I scheduled your procedure for next week. The tricky part is that clinic policy requires both parents to sign off."

I took the papers and tucked them against my skin under my sweater. The sharp edges grazed my flesh, leaving a stinging line of pain.

A thin sheet of paper, holding the entire rest of my life.

"I'll find a way."

I turned down Nina's offer to drive me back. Under her worried gaze, I stepped back out into the swirling snow, trudging forward step by painful step.

Snowflakes whipped against my face, quickly dusting my shoulders and hair. The biting cold seeped through my damp clothes, invading every inch of my body.

Yet I felt numb to the chill. I just kept putting one foot in front of the other.

When I pushed the front door open, Christian was sitting on the couch, carefully peeling an apple for Chloe. Chloe leaned against his shoulder, smiling sweetly, whispering playfully in his ear.

It was a picture of domestic bliss—a scene that drove a jagged blade straight through my heart, reopening wounds I thought had gone completely numb.

Hearing the door, both turned to look at me. Christian’s brow instantly knotted in annoyance.

"You finally decided to drag yourself back? I said two harsh words to you, and you threw a tantrum like a spoiled child!"

"Chloe just got back from overseas. Her habits are different from ours. She offered you a glass of wine out of courtesy, and you made a scene over nothing!"

"She's younger than you. Couldn't you be the bigger person? Look at yourself right now. You don't look anything like a mother. All you do is throw fits, completely selfish, never thinking about anyone else's feelings."

His sharp, cutting words felt like nails driven straight into my chest.

Every single time Chloe was around, he was like this. No matter how out of line her words were, no matter how inappropriate her actions, the moment I showed the slightest trace of hurt or anger, he leaped to her defense, ganging up on me to call me unreasonable.

It was as if I were the unwanted intruder in my own home.

Did anyone ever care about my feelings?

I was only three months older than Chloe.

Taking in my soaked, shivering state, the corners of Chloe's lips curved into a subtle smirk before she spoke in a soft, gentle voice:

"Christian, that’s enough. Valerie came back, so she knows she was wrong. Let her go change before she catches a cold."

With one simple sentence, she cemented the blame onto me.

Christian scoffed, eyeing me with pure disgust.

"Don't waste your sympathy on her. She brought this entirely on herself."

I closed my eyes, a tidal wave of bitter disappointment sweeping through me.

In the past, I would have screamed at him, fighting for fairness and truth.

Now, I was just tired.

He was right about one thing: I brought this on myself. This was my karma for being blinded by love and insisting on marrying him.

Wasting another second or ounce of energy on this man, or this dead marriage, was simply not worth it.