Chapter 1

One year.

Olivia had been gone for one year.

Ethan Cole's real estate empire, Cole Development, was a ghost of itself, teetering on the edge of ruin. His life was a pile of cold ash.

He sat in the silence of the large, empty New York apartment they once shared. Dust motes danced in the weak sunlight filtering through the grimy windows. He hadn't let anyone clean.

His assistant had found the box in a storage unit Olivia had rented. A plain cardboard box, sealed with old tape. "Personal effects," the manifest had said.

Inside, journals. Dozens of them. Leather-bound, cloth-bound, simple spiral notebooks.

Olivia's handwriting, neat and precise, filled every page.

He picked one at random. A dark blue, leather-bound one. The spine was cracked, the pages softened with age. He opened it.

The ink was a faded blue. He began to read.

* * *

(Olivia's Journal - First Person POV)

The day he asked for my hand, or rather, demanded it, the air in his father's study was thick with the smell of old money and fresh cigars. Harrison Cole, a man whose face looked carved from granite, laid out the terms. A merger of families, he called it. Cole Development needed the Hayes legacy, our historical properties. I was part of the acquisition.

Ethan stood by the window, back to me. He didn't say a word.

"It's a good match, Olivia," my own father had said, his voice thin. He was already a broken man then, our family's influence a flickering candle.

I said yes. What else was there to say?

Our wedding day. A spectacle for New York society. I wore a Hayes family heirloom gown, lace yellowed with time. Ethan's face was a mask of indifference. He barely looked at me.

At the altar, when he was supposed to say his vows, he leaned close. His breath smelled of expensive scotch.

"This is a contract, Olivia. Nothing more. Don't forget it." His voice was a low growl, meant only for me.

I looked into his cold, blue eyes. A flicker of something, maybe defiance, maybe just acceptance of the inevitable, rose in me.

"I understand, Ethan," I whispered back. "A contract."

His mother, standing in the front pew, let out a small, strangled gasp. My father simply stared at his shoes. The minister cleared his throat and hurried on.

Later, at the reception, he made his displeasure public. His father proposed a toast to the happy couple. Ethan raised his glass, but his eyes were on a point far beyond me.

"To business," he said, his voice carrying through the suddenly quiet ballroom. "May it always be profitable."

The humiliation was a hot flush on my cheeks. I kept my smile fixed.

He wanted to shame me, to show everyone I was nothing to him. But I wouldn't break. Not there. Not then.

I raised my own glass. "To profitable business, then."

My voice was steady. He looked at me then, a flicker of surprise in his eyes before they hardened again.

He walked away, leaving me standing alone.

Later that night, in the cold, opulent hotel suite, he didn't touch me. He slept on the sofa.

Before he turned his back, he said, "You'll regret this, Olivia. Marrying me."

It wasn't a threat. It was a statement of fact, a promise of the life that awaited me.

Years passed. Or perhaps it was one long, gray year, repeated. Ninety-nine times. That's how many times I found evidence of his affairs. A lipstick stain. A whiff of unfamiliar perfume clinging to his suit. A late-night text message carelessly left on his phone.

Each discovery was a small, sharp pain. At first, I cried. Then, I grew numb.

His warning on our wedding night echoed in my mind. "You'll regret this."

I did. Oh, how I regretted it. But it wasn't just marrying him. It was loving him, despite everything. A foolish, stubborn love I couldn't kill.

He became more blatant. He'd come home, Chloe Vance's expensive, cloying perfume clinging to him like a second skin. He wouldn't even bother to hide it.

"She has better taste than you," he'd sneer, if I dared to even look at him with questioning eyes. "In everything."

He'd leave her things around the apartment. A scarf. An earring. Small, deliberate tortures.

One evening, I found him in our kitchen, trying to replicate a dish. He was clumsy, frustrated.

"Chloe loved this when I made it for her," he muttered, not to me, but to the sputtering pan.

The casual cruelty of it finally broke something within me. Not my love, that was too deeply rooted. But my hope. My willingness to endure silently.

That night, as he prepared to go out again, to her, I stood in his way.

"Ethan," I said. My voice was calm, eerily so.

He scowled. "What now, Olivia? Can't you see I'm busy?"

"I want a divorce."

The words hung in the air.

He stopped, genuinely surprised. Then, a slow, wolfish grin spread across his handsome face.

"Finally," he breathed. "You finally came to your senses."

He thought I'd fight, demand a fortune, make it ugly. He always underestimated me. Or perhaps, he never saw me at all.

"I want nothing, Ethan," I said, my voice still quiet. I pushed a single sheet of paper across the polished hall table. A simple statement, written by me. I would walk away with only what I brought into this marriage. My name. My nearly depleted inheritance.

He picked it up, read it quickly. Disbelief warred with suspicion in his eyes.

"You're serious? No lawyers? No demands for half of everything?"

"I'm serious."

He stared at me, searching for the catch. There was none. I was tired. So incredibly tired. And I knew something he didn't. Time was running out.

"What's your game, Olivia?"

"No game. Just... an end."

He hesitated for another second, then snatched a pen from his pocket and signed his name with a flourish on a divorce petition he'd had drawn up months ago, one he'd taunted me with. He'd been waiting for this moment.

"Good," he said, a wave of relief washing over his features. "Tomorrow. Civil Affairs Bureau. Nine AM. Don't be late."

My stomach clenched. The pain was a familiar companion these days. I nodded. "I'll be there."

As he turned to leave, an official-looking man, probably one of his lawyers waiting discreetly outside, stepped in. The lawyer said something about ensuring a smooth process.

Ethan just smirked. "She won't cause trouble. She knows when she's beaten."

He paused at the door, a final taunt on his lips. He pulled out one of his Cole Development business cards, scribbled something on the back.

"Here," he said, holding it out. "In case you need a job. Though I doubt anyone would hire you."

I took the card. He expected me to throw it back in his face, to scream, to cry.

Instead, I looked at it, then met his eyes. I smiled. A genuine, if weary, smile.

"Thank you, Ethan. I might just take you up on that."

He stared, completely bewildered by my calm. He didn't understand. He couldn't.

He left.

I watched him go. He would regret this. Not the divorce. He'd celebrate that.

He'd regret not seeing. Not knowing.

He'd regret it all, when it was too late.

And I, in my own quiet way, would make sure of it.

* * *

Ethan's hand trembled as he lowered the journal. Olivia's calm. Her strange smile. He remembered it. It had unsettled him then. It terrified him now.

He picked up another journal.