For seven years, I was married to arms dealer Marcus Thorne. My artist's hands learned to assemble guns and follow him through hell. In our seventh year, he became obsessed with a woman given to him as a business gift—pure, innocent, unlike anything in his bloody world. He built her a sanctuary away from his darkness. It all shattered when I found my status listed as “divorced” in public records. When I confronted him, Marcus calmly cleaned his gun. “Serena is choosing me. Name your price.” Enraged, I slapped Serena at their wedding. That night, my sick mother was strapped to an armored vehicle. “You shouldn’t have touched her,” Marcus said coldly. “This is your lesson.” I begged on the wet pavement, but the engine roared. My mother’s blood sprayed my face. Pain seized me—then blackness. I awoke back to the day I discovered the divorce. This time, I didn’t confront him. I booked a flight immediately. My only thought: take my mother and disappear where Marcus could never find us. … “Ma’am, the system shows your current marital status as divorced.” The clerk’s robotic voice yanked me back to the present. My eyes were wide with terror, the phantom scent of my mother’s blood still clinging to the inside of my nose. “When?” I asked, my voice a raw whisper. “August 29th.” The date hit me like a sledgehammer. August 29th. Our seventh wedding anniversary. That day, I’d filled our home with flowers and candles, cooked his favorite meal. I waited until the candles melted into puddles of wax and the roses drooped, but Marcus never came home. He’d been busy divorcing me. I clutched my papers and turned to leave, but a familiar black Bentley was parked at the entrance. In my previous life, I had charged at that car, screaming questions at him. To keep Serena from discovering our relationship, Marcus had smashed the butt of his gun into my jaw, fracturing it. The memory sent a jolt of fear through me. I ducked into the shadows of a nearby alcove. A moment later, the car door opened. Marcus Thorne, the imperious king of his own dark world, opened the passenger door like a chauffeur. He took off his trench coat and draped it gently over the woman’s shoulders, his movements impossibly tender. Serena, dressed in a simple white dress, looked serene and pure, like a jade statue of a goddess standing in the morning light. Marcus took her hand. “Are you sure you want to marry me, Mr. Thorne?” she asked, her voice soft and uncertain. “Of course. I’ve been dreaming of this day. I’m the one who made you break your vows. It’s my responsibility to take care of you.” Serena’s delicate fingers drifted to her slightly rounded belly. “But I was just an ordinary woman from a cloister. I’m not worthy of someone like you. I’m not worthy of carrying your child. Maybe I should…” A possessive kiss cut her off. It was a long time before he pulled away. He cupped her face, his eyes overflowing with adoration. “Serena, no one in this world is more worthy of me than you. And only you are worthy to bear my children.” A sharp, stabbing pain shot through my own abdomen. I pressed my hand against it, tears blurring my vision. I waited until they had disappeared into the building before I stumbled away, my mind set. I took a cab to the hospital and scheduled an abortion. Lying on the examination table, the doctor looked at my ultrasound with a sigh. “Miss Hayes, your uterine wall is naturally thin. This might be the only child you’ll ever be able to have.” I stared at the ceiling, my voice as still and dead as a stagnant pond. “I’m divorced. This child shouldn’t exist.” The cold liquid of the anesthesia entered my veins, and my consciousness began to fade. In the haze, I saw Marcus, his ear pressed against my belly, listening for the baby’s kicks, laughing as he promised to teach our child how to customize a firearm. I saw him poring over books, searching for the perfect, auspicious name. I saw him holding me, promising to leave the blood and violence behind, to be a good father, to live a quiet life with me… And then, the final image burned itself into my mind: his face as he told Serena, “Only you are worthy to bear my children.” Two hours later, pale and drained, I walked into my mother’s hospital room. She was still in a coma, on a ventilator, but she was alive. Whole. Last time, I had gotten her killed. This time, I wouldn’t be so foolish. I used a private channel to arrange for her transfer to a secure facility. I went to the immigration office and filed the paperwork. In three days, when everything was finalized, I would be gone from Marcus’s world forever. As I stood in the rain, a sense of relief, lighter than any I’d felt in years, washed over me. I took a step forward, and three men in masks and hats lunged out of the downpour. Before I could react, the iron pipes in their hands whistled through the air. Pain exploded across my back, and I collapsed to my knees, the rain instantly turning red around me. I didn’t have to guess. They were Marcus’s enemies. I reached for my phone to call for help, but a pipe shattered it in my hand. Then the blows rained down, a merciless storm of metal on bone. Just then, the familiar Bentley glided past the end of the alley. It was Marcus’s car. “Marcus!” I screamed, using every last bit of my strength, struggling to get his attention. The car slowed. My heart hammered against my ribs. He saw me! But a second later, the Bentley accelerated, pulling away without a moment’s hesitation. Through the rain-streaked window, I saw Marcus raise a hand to cover Serena’s eyes. Of course. He couldn’t let his pure, innocent snow-white dove see such a bloody scene. The strength to call out again vanished. Agony ripped through me. Black spots danced in my vision, and the world faded into the coppery smell of my own blood. … When I opened my eyes, it was to the sterile white ceiling of a hospital room. The door was ajar. I heard the voice of Marcus’s right-hand man. “Boss, what if she finds out about Miss Serena? If she starts digging, I don’t think we can keep it hidden.” Marcus stubbed out his cigar. His voice was cold. “That’s not your concern. Your only job is to protect Serena.” “She’s too… clean. She’s not like us.” “Amelia knows every dirty trick in the book. Serena is too simple; she wouldn’t stand a chance against her.” “If you have to, use her mother. That old woman is her only weakness. She’ll do anything to protect her.” My fingers clenched the bedsheet. I bit down on my lip, hard, the taste of blood flooding my mouth. Years ago, when he had proposed, he had knelt on one knee and promised, “Amelia, from now on, I’m here. No one will ever hurt you again.” The same protective instinct, the same promise. Just a different woman. The woman he once shielded was now the dangerous, dirty-tricks-playing villain of his story. Footsteps approached. I squeezed my eyes shut, and when I opened them again, they were a mask of indifference. “You’re awake.” Marcus walked to my bedside and tossed a file onto the sheets. “I had my men look into it. It was the Southeast Asian syndicate.” “This is a truce agreement. Sign it, and they’ve agreed to give up their share of the South American arms market.” Our eyes met. I couldn’t speak. I had nearly been beaten to death by his enemies, and he had turned it into a business negotiation. “Marcus,” I finally managed, my voice a raw croak, “when did you decide to make this deal?” Was it the moment he saw me being attacked? Or had he known they were coming for me all along? He frowned, irritated by my question. I knew better than to press. The answer didn’t matter anymore. As if to appease me, he stayed in my room for the next two days, working from a laptop. But his phone never left his hand. Occasionally, he would smile at the screen, a soft, gentle smile that was once reserved only for me. I suddenly remembered the day we first met, seven years ago. He had been hunted by his rivals, bleeding out on the doorstep of my art studio. He was like a dying wolf, his eyes fierce but hiding a deep vulnerability. I should have called the police. But when our eyes met, some strange impulse made me drag him inside. I hadn’t known then that I was dragging myself into hell. Later, after my family went bankrupt, my father sold me to the largest black market in Southeast Asia. The man who bought me was a sadist. He tortured me until I was barely recognizable. It was Marcus who found me, who saved me. That was the second time we met. And it was then I understood that in this world, kindness was the most useless currency. From that day on, I went from a promising young artist to the infamous “Gun Doll” of the underworld. I assembled his guns, dismantled his bombs, my hands stained with blood that would never wash away. I thought we were partners, standing shoulder to shoulder. But he saw me as tainted, swallowed by the darkness, no longer as pure as the innocent woman he now craved. I looked at my hands. They were meant to hold brushes, to capture mountains and rivers. Now all they knew was the cold, hard steel of a gun. I thought of Serena’s clear, innocent eyes, and a bitter irony washed over me. All my love, all my devotion, had become a joke. After I was discharged, Marcus used his business as an excuse and disappeared. The day before I was scheduled to leave the country, I went to a local temple. I wanted to pray for the child I had lost. At the entrance, I saw Serena. She was tending to an injured stray cat, her simple white dress making her seem even more ethereal. She was clumsy with the antiseptic, and the cat struggled, smearing the medicine everywhere. I walked over and took the cotton swab from her hand. “There are still tiny bits of gravel in the wound. The medicine will only make it hurt more if you don’t clean it out first.” This was the first time we had been alone together since I learned of her existence. She didn’t know who I was. She put her palms together in a gesture of thanks. “Thank you.” I managed a tight smile, my heart surprisingly calm. When I told her I was there for a lost child, her eyes immediately filled with tears. She knelt before the altar, her hands pressed together in prayer. “May the Buddha guide the soul of that unborn child to a peaceful rebirth, and may he grant this mother health and peace.” I stood there, a strange sense of pity welling up inside me. I wanted to warn her that Marcus’s tenderness was a poison, that getting close to him meant being dragged into the abyss. But looking at her devout profile, the words died in my throat. If she knew who I was, she would surely break things off with him. And then, all of Marcus’s rage would be directed at me. The image of my mother’s brutal death flashed in my mind, and a cold dread washed over me. I made an excuse and slipped away. From a secluded corner, I checked the live feed from my mother’s new facility. Seeing a nurse pushing her wheelchair through a garden, I breathed a small sigh of relief. My mother was my only weakness. This time, I would not let her get caught in the crossfire. When I stepped back out, the cold barrel of a gun was pressed against the back of my head. I froze. Across the courtyard, Serena was slumped over, unconscious. I cursed my luck. A second later, the butt of the gun slammed into my neck. …
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