Chapter 3

Serena's POV

I stared at this man I had loved for five years.

"Ethan, you're standing in front of your mistress and asking me if I've lost my mind?"

"Ethan..." Cassandra suddenly pressed a hand to her chest, gasping. "Maybe I shouldn't be here right now..."

"She looks at me like she hates me..."

"Cassandra!"

Ethan's expression shifted in an instant. He turned and gathered Cassandra into his arms before she could fall.

When he looked back at the room, his voice was winter.

"I apologize for the scene, everyone. Ms. Walsh has been struggling with her mental health for some time. She has a severe delusional disorder. The documents she's holding are forged."

The sound went out of the room for me.

Delusional disorder.

Forged.

One sentence. Casual as brushing dust off a sleeve. Five years of marriage, five years of my life, reduced to the punchline of a crazy woman's delusion.

Then my father pushed through the crowd.

His palm connected with my face so hard I stumbled sideways. The taste of blood flooded my mouth.

"You disgrace!" he roared. "Haven't you done enough damage to this family?"

My mother stood just behind him, eyes red. She didn't look at me once.

"Serena, get down on your knees and apologize to Mr. Hartley and Ms. Cassandra right now. How dare you bring something like this and drag their names through the mud."

I stared at my own mother, and the tears I'd been holding finally came.

"Mom... the day I came home from the registry five years ago, you made me soup yourself. You said happy marriage..."

My mother looked away. She couldn't meet my eyes.

My father seized the opening. He snatched the certificate off the table.

In front of the entire room, he tore it in half. Then into pieces. Then into nothing.

The sound of tearing paper was so small. It destroyed me.

He threw the scraps at my feet like trash, then turned to Ethan with a fawning smile.

"Mr. Hartley, please don't give this another thought. I'll take this foolish girl home and deal with her myself. She won't bother you or Ms. Cassandra again."

Ethan looked down at me. He said nothing.

Cassandra gave a soft cough against his chest. He immediately bent toward her, rubbing her back with quiet urgency.

My father's security team moved in and seized my arms.

I struggled. My knee caught the sharp edge of the table and the pain nearly took me down.

Only then did Ethan finally look at me.

"Take her."

The man I had loved without reservation for five years sentenced me with two words.

The front door of my parents' house closed behind me with a heavy thud.

Outside, the party continued, celebrating that couple long into the night.

The cane came down across my back. First the numbness, then the split of skin, then the burning.

My father's voice was low and vicious.

"Do you have any idea what the Cassandra family's backing means? This company cannot survive without their investment. You ran in there tonight and made a scene. Were you trying to take down this entire family with you?"

My mother dabbed at her eyes beside him.

"Why can't you just cooperate? You're talented, you're capable, a little hardship won't break you. But Cassandra has a heart condition. She cannot handle any kind of stress."

I dug my fingernails into my palm until the blood came.

The cane fell again.

I bit down and didn't cry out. Didn't beg.

Because I already knew. No one here would feel sorry for me.

Late that night, the door finally opened.

Ethan walked in, suit jacket draped over his arm, bringing with him the scent of champagne and Cassandra's perfume.

He crouched in front of me and tossed a small tube onto the floor between us. Expensive scar treatment cream.

"Put that on. Don't let it scar. It'll look bad."

I looked up at him.

"The marriage is fake?"

His fingers stilled for a fraction of a second. His tone was matter-of-fact.

"Every major media outlet was there tonight. Cassandra's family too. I had no choice. The bigger picture had to come first."

"And the proposal? Was that the bigger picture too?"

Ethan was quiet for a moment. When he spoke, his voice carried something that almost sounded like tenderness.

"Cassandra has a weak heart. She was so happy tonight. I couldn't humiliate her in front of everyone."

I laughed.

I laughed until my whole body shook, and the movement pulled at the torn skin on my back, and the cold sweat came pouring down my forehead.

Ethan frowned at the sight of me. He softened his voice slightly, the way someone might when handing a coin to a stranger.

"Serena, stop making this harder than it needs to be. You took a beating tonight, you've suffered for it, Cassandra's temper has been vented. We can put this behind us."

Put it behind us?

Before I could process those words, Ethan had already pulled a document from a folder and laid it across my knees.

I looked down.

My family's shares. The company's marital assets accumulated over five years. The projects I had built with my own hands.

Every single thing I was owed, listed under the heading: Unconditional Waiver.

Ethan held out a pen.

"Sign it."

I didn't take it. "You want me to hand over my place as your wife to your mistress, and now you want me to walk away with nothing?"

Ethan's jaw tightened. He looked at me as though I were the unreasonable one.

"Serena, you're strong. You're capable. You don't need me to get by. But Cassandra isn't like you. She's fragile. Without me, she won't survive."

I stared at that pen.

Five years ago, on the day we registered, he had held a pen just like this one and signed his name like it meant something.

His eyes were wet then. He told me: Wherever I am, that's your home.

Now, with that same hand, he was offering me a tube of scar cream and a document that said I had never existed.

And I finally saw it clearly.

What Ethan had given me was never a home. It was a cage. One he could unlock at any moment to sweep me out like something that no longer served a purpose.

Ethan lost patience and forced the pen into my bleeding hand.

"Sign tonight and I'll have someone take you upstairs to rest."

I gripped the pen and looked up at him. "And if I don't?"

Ethan stood. The last thin layer of patience drained out of his expression. He looked down at me like a verdict.

"Then you stay on your knees in this room until you do."

The door closed without mercy.

The tube of cream rolled into the dust beside the table leg.

The document sat open across my knees, the first page already stained dark from the blood still falling from my palm.