Chapter 1

Three years. For three years, I had been Mrs. Sarah Davis. Now, I was going to end it.

The decision settled in my heart, cold and hard. It was a secret I kept from everyone, most of all from my husband, Mark Davis. In our world, divorce was a stain, especially for a woman. Men could discard wives like old coats, but if a woman initiated it, she was judged harshly, her name dragged through the mud. Our society didn't allow for a woman to simply walk away.

A mutual divorce was the only clean way, but it required both signatures on the papers. That was my biggest problem. My husband was not just any man, he was Mark Davis, the most celebrated architect in the city, a man of immense power and influence. He would never agree to a divorce. Not because he loved me, he never had, but because it would be an inconvenience, a disruption to his perfectly curated life.

So, I had to be clever. I had to get his signature without him knowing what he was signing.

I stood across the street from his architectural firm, a sleek glass tower that scraped the sky. The late autumn air was sharp and cold, biting at my exposed skin, but I barely felt it. My focus was entirely on the grand entrance. Inside my purse, my fingers brushed against a single, folded sheet of high-quality paper. It was blank. The real divorce agreement, with all the legal clauses typed out, was safe at my friend Olivia' s house. This blank sheet was my weapon.

The plan was simple, almost foolish, but it was all I had. I would tell him I was practicing calligraphy and that I wanted his signature, a piece of art in itself. His signature was famous, a bold, elegant scrawl that people coveted. It was a believable lie.

Finally, the glass doors swung open. A collective gasp seemed to ripple through the small crowd of admirers and reporters who often waited for him. Mark Davis stepped out. He was tall, dressed in a perfectly tailored black suit that made him look even more imposing. His face was all sharp angles and cool indifference, but it was a face that captivated everyone who saw it. He moved with an easy confidence that commanded attention without ever asking for it.

He scanned the area, his dark eyes sweeping over the faces until they landed on me. There was no recognition, no warmth. Just a flicker of annoyance. He gave a subtle nod to his assistant, a man named Leo, who immediately broke away from the group and walked toward me.

"Mrs. Davis," Leo said quietly, his voice professional but strained. "Mr. Davis would prefer if you waited over here. Out of the way."

He guided me to the side of the building, away from the prying eyes of the press. I followed without a word, my heart a dull, heavy stone in my chest. A few moments later, Mark approached. He stopped a few feet away, his expression unreadable.

"What are you doing here, Sarah?" he asked. His voice was low and cool, the same voice he used with his employees.

My carefully rehearsed words caught in my throat. My hands felt clammy. "It' s cold," I managed to say, my voice sounding weak even to my own ears. "I thought... I thought you might need a coat." I held up the coat I had brought, a useless prop.

He glanced at the coat, then back at me, his eyes dismissive. "You could have sent one of the maids. Or an assistant. You didn' t need to come yourself."

He turned to leave, his back straight and unforgiving. This was it. Now or never.

"Mark, wait," I said, my voice suddenly firm. It was so unusual for me to stop him that he actually paused and turned back, a hint of surprise in his eyes.

I pulled the blank sheet of paper from my purse, my hands trembling slightly. "I know this is a strange time, but... could you sign this for me?"

He frowned, his gaze dropping to the paper. "Sign it? What for?"

"I' ve taken up calligraphy," I lied, trying to keep my voice steady. "Your signature is... it' s a piece of art. I wanted to use it as a model to practice." I knew he was proud of his signature, of his brand.

He hesitated. His eyes narrowed, searching my face for a reason to refuse. In that moment, a car pulled up to the curb, and a woman stepped out. Emily Carter. His former fiancée. His one true love.

Mark' s entire posture changed. The coldness in his eyes melted away, replaced by a warmth I hadn' t seen in three years. He was completely distracted. Emily was walking toward them, a bright smile on her face.

Seeing his attention completely captured by her, I pushed the paper and a pen into his hand again. "Please, Mark. It will only take a second."

He glanced from me to the approaching Emily, then quickly scrawled his name on the bottom of the blank page. He didn't even look at what he was signing. He just wanted to get rid of me before Emily reached him.

He handed the paper back to me. My heart sank, a bitter mix of relief and pain. My plan had worked, but the reason it worked was a fresh wound.

"Thank you," I whispered, folding the paper carefully and putting it back in my purse.

Emily arrived, her eyes sparkling as she looked at Mark. "Mark! I was just passing by." Then her gaze fell on me, curious and friendly. "Hello. I don' t think we' ve met."

Before I could say a word, Mark stepped slightly in front of me, partially blocking her view of me. "This is just a cousin of mine," he said casually, his voice soft and gentle for Emily. "She was just dropping off a coat for me."

A cousin. Not his wife. A cousin. The word hit me harder than a slap. I was his wife of three years, and he had just dismissed me as a distant relative to the woman he truly loved.

Our marriage had always been a secret. It was Mark' s decision from the start. He was a celebrated public figure, known for his genius and his aloof, private nature. He didn' t want the world prying into his personal life. I had fallen for him hard, a quiet admirer from a distance. His status and cold demeanor kept most people away, but I saw something else in him, a hidden loneliness that I desperately wanted to soothe.

Three years ago, out of the blue, he had proposed. I was so overjoyed I thought I was dreaming. I accepted without a second thought, believing it was the start of a fairytale. Only after the wedding did I discover the devastating truth. He had proposed to me just days after Emily Carter, his childhood friend and colleague, had returned from abroad. Her engagement to another man had fallen through, and she had come home. Mark, who had loved her his entire life, was heartbroken. He married me on an impulse, a desperate act to escape his pain, to prove to himself and to her that he had moved on.

But he never did. And I was just the woman who filled the empty space beside him.