Chapter 1

The harsh, sterile light of the emergency room reflected off the polished floor, a familiar sight that usually brought me a sense of calm and purpose. Tonight, it felt like a spotlight in a theater of humiliation. There on the gurney, his designer jeans cut away by a paramedic, was my husband, Liam Carter. He was clutching his groin, his face pale and contorted in pain.

Next to him, a young woman with tear-streaked mascara and a crop top was holding his hand, her voice a high-pitched whine. "Is he going to be okay, Doctor? He just... he just collapsed."

"Liam?" I said, my voice barely a whisper. The chart in my hand felt impossibly heavy. Priapism. A prolonged, painful erection. A side effect of certain recreational drugs often used to enhance sexual performance.

The young woman looked up at me, her eyes wide and confused. "You know him?"

I couldn't form the words. My husband. The celebrated war photographer. My partner of ten years. Tonight was our wedding anniversary. I had a reservation at our favorite restaurant, a bottle of vintage champagne chilling at home, a new silk dress waiting. And he was here, in my hospital, with a condition caused by a cheap party drug, accompanied by a girl who couldn't be older than twenty-two.

"I'm his wife," I finally managed to say, the words tasting like acid in my mouth.

The girl' s jaw dropped. "His... wife? But he told me he was divorced! He said... he said I was his girlfriend."

The air left my lungs. The sounds of the ER-the beeping monitors, the distant wail of a siren, the hurried footsteps-faded into a dull roar. Humiliation, hot and sharp, washed over me. Everyone was watching. Nurses I'd trained, residents who looked up to me, colleagues who respected me. Dr. Evelyn Reed, the brilliant cardiac surgeon, the woman who held hearts in her hands, couldn't even hold her own marriage together.

"Dr. Reed?" A calm, steady voice cut through the haze. It was Alex Chen, my best orthopedic resident, my protégé. He stood a few feet away, his expression carefully neutral, but his eyes were full of concern. He held a tablet, pretending to review a case. "I'll handle this intake. You have that consult on the fifth floor, remember? I'll make sure... everything is handled discreetly."

For a second, I felt a wave of relief. He was offering me an escape, a professional shield against this very personal disaster. But then I looked back at Liam, who was now avoiding my gaze, his charismatic face suddenly looking weak and pathetic. The relief curdled into a new, potent form of anger.

"No, Dr. Chen," I said, my voice cold and clear, surprising even myself. "I'll handle it. He's my patient now." I turned my full attention to Liam, my professional mask snapping into place. "Mr. Carter, can you describe the onset of the pain?"

Liam flinched at the formal address. "Evelyn, honey, let's not do this here. I can explain."

"There is nothing to explain," I said, my voice flat. I looked at the young woman, Willow, as she had introduced herself. "And you. You can wait in the waiting room. Or you can leave. It makes no difference to me." I stripped off my wedding ring, the simple platinum band we'd chosen together a decade ago, and dropped it onto the gurney next to his hand. It made a small, metallic clink. "We're done, Liam. Consider this my anniversary gift to you."

The memory of him sliding that ring on my finger felt like a scene from someone else's life. He had whispered promises of a lifetime, of honesty, of a partnership built on mutual respect. He was the artist, the adventurer, and I was the anchor, the steady hand. He traveled the world capturing images of conflict and chaos, but he always came home to me, to the quiet life we had built. He said he needed it. He said he needed me.

It was all a lie. Every shared memory was now tainted. The photographs of us that lined our hallway-laughing in Paris, hiking in a national park, celebrating his gallery opening-they were props in a play where I was the only one who didn't know my lines were part of a tragedy.

I remembered the conversation we'd had five years ago, after a miscarriage had left me devastated. I couldn't go through that again, I'd told him. He had held me, his voice soft and reassuring. "I'll take care of it, Ev. I'll get a vasectomy. We don't need kids to be a family. I only need you." He had even shown me the paperwork, the doctor's appointment. Another lie. A calculated, cruel manipulation to keep me, to keep our perfect life intact while he did whatever, and whoever, he wanted. The thought of it, the depth of the deceit, made me physically sick.

A sharp beep from my pager sliced through my spiraling thoughts. Code Blue, ICU. Dr. Reed, STAT.

A patient was crashing. My personal hell would have to wait. I took a deep, shuddering breath, pushing the image of Liam and his mistress out of my mind. I was a surgeon first. I had a life to save.

As I walked away, I didn't look back. The anger was a block of ice in my chest, preserving me. Later, when the adrenaline wore off, the pain would come. But for now, there was only the cold, hard certainty of what I had to do. After I saved my patient's life, I was going to go back to that room and systematically destroy Liam's. I would give him a "surprise" he would never forget.