Left To Die: Now The CEO Begs

On our third anniversary, my husband Marcus walked out on our dinner because his "best friend" Izzy had a crisis.

That was the ninth time he chose her call over my presence. According to the sick bet I made with her years ago, it was game over.

But the true end didn't come in a restaurant. It happened inside a plummeting elevator.

When the cable snapped and the emergency brakes slammed us to a halt, I lay trapped under debris, my leg fractured and head bleeding. Izzy, terrified but scratched-free, screamed for help.

Marcus didn't even look at me.

He stepped over my broken body to scoop her up.

"I've got you, Iz," he whispered, carrying her out to safety while I lay alone in the dust, gasping his name.

He left me to die in that metal box.

Later, when I confronted him, he called me "unstable" and "jealous." He claimed I was a burden, a placeholder he married just to pass the time until Izzy was ready for him.

He even shoved me into a freezing lake to protect her from a confrontation she started.

He thought I would always be there, the pathetic wife waiting in the shadows. He thought his love was a prize I would endure any torture to keep.

He was wrong.

I signed the divorce papers, threw my ring into the ocean, and vanished without a trace.

Three years later, I returned to New York as a celebrated artist, with a man who treated me like a masterpiece, not a prop.

Marcus, now ruined by Izzy's lies and stripped of his fortune, found me. He knelt in the rain on the city street, weeping, begging for one more chance to fix us.

I looked down at the husband who had let me drown.

"There is no 'us', Marcus," I said calmly.

Then I turned my back on him and walked into my future.

Chapter 1

Ellie POV

The ninth time Marcus left me, the champagne was still bubbling in my glass.

It was our third anniversary. The waiter had just finished pouring the vintage Dom Pérignon, the golden bubbles racing to the surface to mimic the frantic rhythm of my heartbeat.

Marcus checked his phone. His face, usually a mask of composed indifference, cracked.

"Izzy needs me," he said. Statement. Not a question. And certainly not an apology.

He just stood up, his napkin fluttering onto the untouched risotto like a surrender flag.

I sat frozen. The restaurant was dim, romantic, and suffocatingly filled with couples whispering promises they intended to keep. I stared at the empty chair opposite me.

"Sit down, Marcus," I whispered, my voice trembling. "Please. Just for tonight."

He didn't even look at me. He was already buttoning his jacket, his mind already halfway across the city.

"She's having a crisis, Ellie. You know how fragile she is."

I knew. I knew exactly the brand of fragility Isabella 'Izzy' Vance peddled. She was as fragile as a diamond and just as capable of cutting glass.

Marcus walked out. He didn't look back.

Through the rain-streaked window, I watched as he hailed a cab in the downpour. But he didn't get in alone.

A figure stepped out from the shadows of the awning next door. Izzy.

She wasn't in crisis. She was wearing a trench coat that was belted just a little too tightly, her hair perfectly disheveled for the performance. She threw her arms around his neck, sobbing into his chest.

He held her. He held her with a tenderness he had never shown me in three years of marriage.

My phone buzzed against the tabletop. A text from Izzy.

*Game over, Ellie. That makes nine.*

The bet.

My stomach lurched, bile rising sharp and hot in my throat. The memory assaulted me, dragging me back to that dorm room four years ago. The air thick with cheap perfume and malice.

Izzy, sitting cross-legged on her bed, a cruel smile playing on her lips.

*"Let's make it interesting,"* she had said. *"I'll let you have him. I'll let you play house. But if he leaves you for me nine times-nine specific times where he chooses my call over your presence-you walk away. Forever."*

I had agreed. I was young, stupid, and blindingly in love with Marcus Thorne. I thought my love was a shield. I thought my devotion would make him stay.

I was wrong.

Tonight was the ninth time.

I looked at the text again. Then I looked out the window. Marcus was opening the cab door for her, shielding her head with his hand. The same hand that had placed a ring on my finger.

Something inside me snapped. It wasn't a loud break. It was a quiet, structural failure. Like a building collapsing into its own footprint.

I didn't cry. The tears I had shed over the last three years could have filled the Hudson, but tonight, I was dry. I felt a strange, terrifying clarity.

I looked down at my hand. The diamond was heavy. It felt like an anchor dragging me to the bottom of the ocean.

I gripped the ring. My knuckles turned white. With a sharp tug, I slid it off. It left a pale band on my finger, a ghost of a commitment that never really existed.

I placed the ring on the table, next to the still-bubbling champagne.

I stood up. My legs felt shaky, but my mind was steel. I walked out of the restaurant, past the sympathetic glances of the waiters, past the life I had tried so desperately to build.

The rain hit me like icy needles. I didn't hail a cab. I just walked. I walked until my heels blistered and my dress was soaked through.

I thought about the last three years. The nights I waited up. The dinners I ate alone. The way I reorganized my entire life to fit into the small spaces he left for me.

I had been a placeholder. A warm body to keep his bed occupied while he played knight in shining armor to Izzy's damsel in distress.

My phone buzzed again. Marcus.

*Sorry. Had to go. Izzy is safe now. Don't wait up.*

Safe. She was safe. And I was drowning.

I stopped in the middle of the sidewalk. People rushed past me, heads ducked against the storm. I took a deep breath, inhaling the scent of wet asphalt and exhaust.

"I am done," I said to the empty street.

The words were swallowed by the traffic noise, but I heard them. They echoed in my chest, filling the hollow space where my hope used to be.

I looked up at the gray sky. The rain washed over my face, mixing with the mascara running down my cheeks.

This time, I choose myself.