Chapter 2

Liam drove them home in a tense silence. He dropped her bags just inside the door of their large, sterile house, a place Ava had once tried so hard to make a home.

"The nanny will be here in the morning. Brenda is sending over some dinner later," he said, already backing toward the door. "I have to get back to the office. We' re closing a big deal."

He didn' t wait for a reply. The front door clicked shut, leaving Ava alone with the baby carrier in the silent foyer. The house felt empty, hollow. It always had.

In her past life, she had believed his excuses. She' d told herself his ambition was for their family, that his long hours were a sacrifice he was making for them. Now she knew the truth. He wasn' t running toward success; he was running away from her. His coldness toward Leo wasn' t because he was a new, nervous father. It was because Leo was her son, a physical reminder of the convenient marriage he was trapped in. He didn't love her, so he couldn't love their child. The realization didn't bring pain anymore, just a profound, clarifying emptiness.

A sharp cramp seized her abdomen, a brutal reminder of her body' s recent trauma. She winced, leaning against the wall for support. Her phone rang. It was Liam.

"Did you get the pain medication the doctor prescribed?" he asked, his voice devoid of any real concern. It was a question asked out of obligation.

"No," she said.

"You should take it. The nanny can' t help if you' re in pain."

He was thinking of the logistics, not of her. She hung up without another word. She would handle it herself. She found the pills, took one with a glass of water, and slowly made her way to the nursery. She looked down at Leo, sleeping peacefully in his bassinet. He was just a baby. He wasn't the boy who would reject her yet. But the potential was there, a seed planted by Liam and Chloe that she had unknowingly watered with her own desperate love. This time, she wouldn' t make that mistake.

The baby started to cry, a thin, reedy wail that grated on Ava' s raw nerves. She picked him up, her movements stiff and unsure. She checked his diaper, tried to feed him, but he kept crying.

Liam came home hours later to the sound of a screaming infant. He walked into the nursery, his face a mask of irritation.

"Can' t you make him stop?" he snapped. "I have an early morning."

"I' m trying," Ava said, her voice strained.

"Just give him whatever he wants," Liam said, before turning and walking out, closing his bedroom door behind him.

Ava knew then that she couldn' t do this alone, not in this house, not with this man. The next morning, when the nanny arrived, Ava felt a wave of relief. She needed help, not from Liam, but from professionals.

Brenda arrived shortly after, full of unsolicited advice. "You must feed him on a strict schedule, Ava. Don' t pick him up every time he cries. You' ll spoil him." In her first life, Ava had argued, defending her own maternal instincts. The arguments had been constant and exhausting, driving a deeper wedge between her and Liam' s family.

This time, Ava just smiled thinly. "You' re right, Brenda. Thank you for the advice."

Brenda looked taken aback by her easy compliance but was pleased. Ava had learned. Some battles weren' t worth fighting. Letting Brenda think she was in control was a small price to pay for peace.

A few days later, the doorbell rang. Ava opened it to find Chloe Peterson standing on her doorstep, a bright, calculating smile on her face. She was holding a container of what looked like homemade soup.

"Liam mentioned you just got home," Chloe said, her voice smooth as silk. "He was worried you weren't eating well. I was just in the neighborhood, so I thought I' d drop this off. I' m a colleague of his from the office."

A colleague. The lie was so blatant it was almost funny. Ava' s heart gave a familiar, painful thud. She remembered this moment. This was how it had started last time-Chloe, inserting herself into their lives under the guise of friendship.

"That' s very thoughtful of you," Ava said, her voice carefully neutral. She took the soup. "Liam is in his study if you want to say hello."

"Oh, I don' t want to interrupt his work," Chloe said, but she was already stepping past Ava into the house.

Ava' s senses were on high alert. She put the soup in the kitchen and walked back toward the living room, intending to sit with them, to make her presence known. But she stopped in the hallway, hidden from view, when she heard their voices.

"Is she always this... quiet?" Chloe asked, her tone laced with a mix of pity and disdain.

Liam sighed, a sound of pure exhaustion. "She' s been like this since the hospital. Moody. I don' t know what' s wrong with her."

"Poor thing. Postpartum can be so difficult," Chloe said, her sympathy sounding utterly fake. "It must be hard for you, dealing with all this on top of work. And a baby."

There was a pause. Then Liam spoke, his voice low and confessional, the words striking Ava with the force of a physical blow, even though she knew they were coming.

"I know. Sometimes I wonder what I was thinking. Marrying her was... practical. She was stable, she admired me. I thought it would be enough. But Chloe... it' s always been you. You know that, right?"

Ava leaned against the wall, the cold plaster seeping through her shirt. She didn't need to hear Chloe's saccharine reply. She had heard enough. The last illusion of her marriage, the faint hope that maybe, just maybe, he had loved her, even a little, was shattered into a million pieces. There was nothing left to salvage. There was only the escape plan.