Nine months of pregnancy, a textbook delivery expected any moment. But my husband Kenny’s friend, Dr. Chloe Shaw, made a fatal mistake. Instead of the labor-inducing drug I needed, she administered the one that terminates a pregnancy. While I was hemorrhaging on a hospital bed, my miscarriage becoming a trending tragedy on the news, Kenny was spotted at a downtown food truck, grilling steak skewers for Chloe. The entire city was waiting for me to explode, to tear them apart in a public spectacle. I did nothing of the sort. When I confronted Chloe, she gave me the full "career woman" sermon, smoke curling from her lips. "You think the world revolves around men and petty drama, don't you? Some of us have more important things to do than bicker over who's sleeping with whom." She was all cool confidence. "Your husband is the one chasing me. I don't believe in love, and I certainly don't waste my time on jealousy." She promised she would cut things off with Kenny. But when I returned home that night, Kenny was waiting. His eyes were bloodshot as his hands closed around my neck, squeezing. "What did you say to her?" he snarled, his voice a low growl. "Do you have any idea how much time and effort it takes me to calm her down after one of your little scenes?" ... When my assistant reported this to me over the phone, I actually laughed. Kenny, the immaculate, obsessive Kenny, who claimed to have a crippling germaphobia, wouldn't even touch me without me first going through a full cleansing ritual. Now he was slumming it at a greasy food truck, getting smoke and char on his designer clothes for her. "Keep me updated," I whispered, my voice tight, my fingernails digging so deep into my palm I didn't even feel the skin break. I was about to hang up when a nurse bustled into my private room, a clipboard in her hand. "Mr. Heston sent this over," she said, her tone brisk and dismissive. "It's a liability waiver. You need to sign it, confirming your miscarriage was the result of you taking unprescribed medication against medical advice." My child was Kenny's child, too. And he wasn't just letting the killer get away with it. He was helping her bury the evidence, to scrub Chloe’s hands clean of our baby’s blood. My knuckles went white as I gripped the papers. I looked up at the nurse, my voice trembling despite my effort to keep it steady. "Do you know who I am?" She scoffed. "I don't care who you are. Dr. Shaw has Mr. Heston in her corner. I suggest you sign the papers and stop making trouble. It’ll be better for you in the long run." When I didn't move, she had the audacity to grab my hand, trying to force the pen into my fingers. "Stop!" A senior doctor rushed into the room, blocking the nurse's path. His face was pale. "Are you insane?" he hissed at her. "This is Ms. Elara Vance. She is the primary benefactor of this entire hospital. Her family has invested tens of millions. Do you want to be blacklisted from every medical institution in the country?" The nurse’s condescending smirk vanished. She dropped to her knees, her forehead hitting the polished floor with a sickening thud, the pride she wore moments before now trampled into dust. The senior doctor tried to smooth things over, suggesting a woman of my stature shouldn't concern herself with such trivial matters. The matter was trivial. But my business with Kenny Heston was anything but. He didn't call once during the week I was in the hospital. Not a single text. The day I was discharged, I went to find him. At Chloe's apartment. It was in a grimy, rat-infested alley on the forgotten edge of the city. Yet Kenny, the man who preached about hygiene and purity, had apparently been living here for a week. The door was wide open. Chloe was leaning against the frame, smoking a post-coital cigarette, her eyes hazy. She saw me and her lip curled in a sneer. "Of course. The second you hear he's with me, you come running to make a scene," she said, her voice dripping with contempt. "Is your entire life just about a man? Would you just shrivel up and die without one? You're an embarrassment to women everywhere." She tapped her own cheek, a gesture of disgust aimed at me. I smiled. A flick of my wrist and this woman would be fired. Another, and she'd never work in a public institution again. She wasn't worth my time. I cut straight to the point. "Where is he?" Kenny emerged from the dim apartment, rubbing the sleep from his eyes. And in that instant, a cryptic social media post Chloe had made a week ago suddenly made perfect, sickening sense. “Some men are lions. This one’s a dragon, and he needs taming.” Any lingering hope I had withered and died. The betrayal was no longer a suspicion; it was a certainty. When he saw me, Kenny jolted awake, instinctively covering himself. His expression screamed, Property of Chloe Shaw: Do Not Touch. It was a far cry from the man who used to whisper in my ear during our most intimate moments. “Elara, you’re so soft, so perfect. I love you so much I’d die for you…” I closed my eyes, letting that memory turn to ash. When I opened them again, they were clear. "I want a divorce." Kenny froze, then, unbelievably, he smirked and leaned in close, his voice a conspiratorial whisper. "Don't be dramatic. Can't you see what this is? I'm just… practicing." "You just had a miscarriage," he continued, his tone patronizing. "Your body is weak. I can't risk hurting you if I lose control. I have to practice my technique on someone else." Yes, he was a man who lost control. The angry, possessive marks covering Chloe's body were a testament to that. Chloe, having finished her cigarette, blew a final plume of smoke in his direction. "So little masculine energy," she drawled. Kenny’s body went rigid. He violently shoved me away. "You want to do this?" he spat, his voice turning ugly. "I work my ass off to provide for you, and I can't have a little fun? You sit at home all day doing nothing, and instead of being supportive, you hound me? With your status, what would you even do without me? If you learn to behave, maybe I'll find time to come home on Sundays." Chloe chimed in, pointing a finger at me. "You chose to be a housewife. You should know your place. If you're going to live off a man, you exist to please him. You don't get to ask questions." Kenny nodded eagerly. "Chloe gets it. She's a modern woman. We have more in common." Looking at this stranger before me, a cold fire ignited in my chest. I kept my voice steady, dangerously calm. "Is that your final answer?" He frowned. "What do you mean?" I ignored him and dialed my assistant. "Terminate our partnership with Heston Corp. Liquidate all our shares, dump them at a loss if you have to. I want their credit lines frozen and their capital chain shattered by morning." My assistant, the consummate professional, didn't ask why. "Yes, Ms. Vance. It will take a few hours to execute." The small apartment fell silent. Then, Kenny and Chloe burst into hysterical laughter. "Are you insane?" Kenny wheezed. "You think Heston Corp is some street-side taco stand you can just wish out of existence? Go home and do the dishes, Elara. Stop daydreaming." They took turns mocking me, their words a duet of derision. Finally, Kenny shoved me toward the door, telling me to go home and wait for him. They didn't believe me. But the countdown to Heston Corp's demise had already begun. I went home, packed a single bag, and left the house I had shared with him for ten years without a backward glance. That night, I didn't sleep a wink. I woke the next morning to a new viral story about Kenny. At dawn, he had posted a video. In it, he was kneeling on a bed of nails, tearfully listing his "sins" and begging Chloe for forgiveness. It was a pathetic, groveling performance. The public, however, didn't see it as a lover's quarrel. They saw it as a reflection of my cruelty. He was a powerful CEO, and I had supposedly driven him to this public humiliation over a petty jealousy. The comments were brutal. "Does she have to air their dirty laundry in public? One woman's fit of pique is ruining a good man's reputation." "To be this much of a failure as a wife… pathetic." I didn't understand the vitriol until Kenny stormed into my hotel room. He didn't say a word. He just lunged, his hands clamping around my throat, his eyes blazing red. "You couldn't just let it go, could you?" he seethed. "Just because of a few steak skewers, you had to threaten Chloe, leak the malpractice story, and ruin her career! Was it worth it?" "Do you know how she's been? A complete wreck! I can't even console her anymore!" So that was it. His rage wasn't about his reputation; it was because his mistress was upset. He saw the confusion on my face and threw a stack of photos at me. They were gruesome, bloody pictures of a slaughtered cow, knives stuck in it at grotesque angles. "Since you hate beef so much," he hissed, "I'll make every cow in this city suffer!" "I didn't send those to her," I said, my voice hoarse. He didn't believe me. "It's gone too far. You're going to the press. You're going to confess that you caused your own miscarriage by taking illegal drugs. And you're going to apologize to Chloe in front of the entire country." "I will not apologize for something I didn't do." For a split second, I saw murder in his eyes. He smiled, a slow, dangerous smile, and produced a small, ornate box from his coat. My baby’s urn. "If you don't do as I say," he whispered, "this little box might just slip and fall. It would be a shame for it to shatter, wouldn't it?" My vision narrowed. "How... how do you have that?" "That doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is your answer. Will you apologize, or not?" My body trembled. I stared at the urn, a wave of helpless, sickening despair washing over me. I had lost. "Fine," I choked out. "I'll do it." He didn't care that our child was dead. He didn't even care enough to respect his ashes. For Chloe, he had become a monster. I remembered then. The car crash I’d had a year ago; he was too busy attending Chloe’s promotion ceremony to sign my emergency surgery consent form. The ultrasound appointment he’d missed; he was in the gastroenterology unit next door, getting his stomach pumped because he'd eaten pork, a meat Chloe found "disgusting." He had remade his entire life for her. And he would unmake mine to keep her happy.
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