Chapter 1

My husband, Deegan, plunged a needle into my heavily pregnant belly. He said it was a mild sedative to "slow things down." The truth was a brutal betrayal.

His brother's widow, Karmen, was also due, and her son had to be born first to secure the family inheritance. He was sacrificing our child for money.

He locked me in a panic room, leaving me to suffer through agonizing contractions alone.

His sister found me, not to help, but to kick me and let her venomous snake sink its fangs into my arm.

As I lay bleeding out, my baby dying inside me, he had all the life-saving medical equipment moved to Karmen's private clinic, leaving me with nothing.

He called me a manipulative actress, a gold-digger trying to steal the inheritance. The man who swore to protect me left me to die on a cold floor, choosing a birthright over his own child.

But I didn't die. My billionaire father saved me, and I was reborn from the ashes of my grief. Years later, when Deegan stormed into my boardroom, convinced he could drag his "dead" wife home, I looked at the pathetic man he'd become. I slowly pulled the wedding ring from my finger and let it fall to the floor.

"The woman who loved you died that night."

Chapter 1

Jada Norman POV:

I watched Deegan Manning, the man I loved, plunge a needle into my heavily pregnant belly, the precise, practiced motion of a surgeon, not a husband. My breath caught, a hot, acrid taste in my throat. The room smelled of antiseptics and betrayal.

My body felt like a heavy, waterlogged boat, drifting. Every muscle ached with the effort of simply existing. My baby was due any day now, a tiny, insistent presence that had filled me with such overwhelming joy just hours ago. Now, a cold dread was settling deep in my bones.

This wasn't a hospital, not really. It was one of Deegan's private panic rooms, upgraded with high-tech medical equipment. White walls, sterile light, and silence. A silence that pressed in on me, making my ears ring.

"What are you doing, Deegan?" I whispered, my voice rough, barely audible even to myself. My heart hammered against my ribs, a frantic bird trapped in a cage.

He didn't look at me, his handsome face a mask of focus. His fingers, usually so gentle when they touched my swollen belly, were now firm, unyielding. He pushed the plunger down. I felt a cold burn spread from the injection site, searing through my veins. It wasn't pain, not yet, but a creeping numbness that was far more terrifying.

"It's a mild sedative," he said, his voice clipped, devoid of the warmth I had once believed was meant only for me. "To slow things down."

My eyes widened. "Slow things down? Deegan, I'm already having contractions. They've been coming for hours. We need to get to the hospital."

He finally met my gaze, and a shiver ran through me. His eyes, once full of a love that had felt like my entire world, were now hard, opaque. Like polished stones. "You can endure it, Jada. You're strong."

The first wave of intense pain hit me then, a tightening, twisting agony that radiated from my lower back to my abdomen. It stole the air from my lungs, leaving me gasping. The sedative wasn't working fast enough, or maybe it wasn't strong enough. Maybe it was just making things worse.

"Deegan, please," I choked out, tears rolling down my temples to disappear into my hair. "It hurts. We have to go. The baby..."

He remained impassive, watching my struggle as if I were a particularly difficult math problem he was trying to solve. "Karmen's due date is the same as yours, Jada," he stated, his voice flat. He might as well have been discussing the weather. "The will is very clear. The firstborn grandson inherits."

The words hit me harder than the contraction. Karmen. His deceased brother's widow. She was pregnant too, with a son who would be the direct heir to the Manning Corporation. I had known about the will, of course. Everybody in Deegan's family knew. It was the driving force behind his ambition, his entire existence. But I never thought it would come to this. Never.

"What does that have to do with me? With our baby?" I cried, another wave of pain gripping me. My body instinctively curled, my hands pressing against my belly. "Deegan, this is our child!"

His jaw tightened. "My father's will, Jada. It's legally binding. My brother's son... he's the one. Karmen is fragile. She's been through so much. She needs every advantage, every comfort." His voice softened, a tone he hadn't used with me in what felt like forever. "She's alone now, without my brother."

Alone? I was the one trapped in a sterile room, sedated against my will, in agony. My husband, the man who swore to protect me, was standing over me, defending another woman.

"You love me, don't you?" I asked, a desperate plea. "You said you did. You said we were a team. Our child..."

He knelt beside the gurney, his face inches from mine. For a moment, a flicker of something-regret? pity?-crossed his eyes, but it was quickly extinguished. "I do love you, Jada. But this is bigger than us. The Manning legacy... it depends on this. Karmen needs to deliver first. Safely."

The sedative was starting to take hold, a heavy fog rolling into my mind, mixing with the sharp, burning pain of my contractions. My body felt like it was betraying me, fighting against the drugs, fighting for my baby. It was a war raging inside me.

"Please, Deegan," I begged, my voice hoarse. "Just take me to a real hospital. I can't... I can't do this here."

He reached out, his hand closing around my throat. Not tightly enough to stop my breathing, but firm enough to demand my full attention. His eyes bore into mine, cold and accusing. "Stop it, Jada. Stop pretending."

My heart clenched. Pretending? He thought I was faking this? The agonizing contractions, the burning pain in my arm, the fear for my child?

"You think I'm faking?" I gasped, the words catching in my throat. My vision blurred slightly, tears or the drug, I couldn't tell.

"Don't play the innocent wife with me," he hissed, his voice low and menacing. "I know your tricks. You're trying to steal the inheritance. Undermine Karmen. You always wanted to be top dog, didn't you? To secure your position."

His words were like a slap across the face, cold and shocking. "I don't care about the inheritance! I care about our baby, Deegan! I care about you!"

He laughed, a harsh, humorless sound. "Lies. Just like you tried to force Karmen to sign that pre-birth waiver. To give up her son's rights. You think I don't know what you're capable of?"

My head swam. I couldn't believe what I was hearing. He thought I was evil. He thought I would harm another woman's child for money. He thought I would harm our child.

Another contraction ripped through me, more violent than the last. My body convulsed, my hands clenching into fists on the sterile sheets. My face was pale, clammy.

"The baby... he's coming," I whispered, barely able to form the words. "He's coming now."

"He's coming when Karmen's son is safely delivered," Deegan corrected, his voice flat, devoid of emotion. He pulled his hand from my throat. "You'll wait. When Karmen has given birth, I'll be back to deal with you. You're carrying my flesh and blood, Jada. Don't forget that."

But the way he said it, it wasn't a comfort. It was a threat. A promise that I was nothing more than a vessel, an inconvenience he needed to manage. He turned on his heel, the heavy steel door of the panic room hissing shut behind him. The click of the lock echoed in the sudden, oppressive silence.

I was alone. Trapped. In agonizing pain. And the man who was supposed to love me, the father of my child, was out there, waiting for another woman to give birth.