Chapter 4

Ethan' s face shifted from anger to a calculated expression of concern. He stepped closer, his eyes scanning the bruises on my arms, the cut on my lip.

"Ava, your injuries..." he began, his voice soft and full of fake sympathy. "We should have a doctor look at you again. I' m worried."

The performance was so transparent it was insulting. I almost laughed.

"You' re worried?" I shot back, my voice dripping with sarcasm. "Were you worried when you were uploading that video? Were you worried when you heard a mob attacking me on our lawn while you were comforting your mistress?"

His face fell. The fake concern vanished, replaced by a cold defensiveness. He knew he was caught.

"I told you," he said, his tone sharp. "I did that to protect Chloe."

"You keep saying that," I said, stepping around him to grab my purse. "Protect Chloe. Protect the baby. What was so important about protecting an influencer' s reputation that it was worth destroying your wife' s?"

He let out an exasperated sigh, as if explaining a complex theory to a simple-minded child.

"Because her reputation is her livelihood, Ava! It' s her entire career! One viral scandal, and she' s finished. She loses everything. All her brand deals, her followers, her income. Everything."

He gestured around the room, at the life we had built.

"What about you? You' re a brilliant architect. You work for a firm. Your reputation is built on your talent, on the buildings you design. A stupid, fake video can' t take that away from you. People will forget. It doesn' t affect your ability to do your job. It was a calculated risk, and I chose the path with the least amount of long-term damage for everyone involved."

I just stared at him. The cold, logical way he explained his betrayal was more painful than the act itself. He had weighed my safety, my dignity, and my emotional well-being against Chloe' s social media career and decided mine was the more disposable asset. He didn't see me as a person he had vowed to love and protect. He saw me as a variable in an equation, a problem to be managed.

A bitter, broken sound escaped my lips. It started as a sob but twisted into a laugh. It was the laugh of someone who had seen the absolute bottom, the laugh of someone with nothing left to lose.

"Least amount of damage?" I repeated, the words tasting like poison. "I was beaten, Ethan. By a mob you incited. I have a concussion. I could have been killed. And you call that the 'least amount of damage' ?"

My heart, which I thought had already shattered into a million pieces, broke all over again. The pain was immense, a vast, empty canyon where my love for him used to be.

"We' re done," I said, the words feeling more real and final than any vows we had spoken. "I want you out of this house. Or I' m leaving. Either way, this is over."

He looked genuinely shocked, as if he couldn' t comprehend that his flawless logic hadn' t won me over.

"Ava, you can' t be serious," he stammered. "After everything we' ve been through? All our plans?"

My mind flashed back, unbidden, to a sunnier day two years ago. We were on a hike, standing on a cliff overlooking the ocean. The wind was whipping my hair around my face. He had pulled me close, his arms wrapped around me from behind.

"One day, I' m going to build you a house right here, Ava," he had whispered in my ear. "With a huge window so you can watch the sunset every night. A home for us. Forever."

I had believed him. I had sketched out the design in a notebook, a secret dream I shared only with him.

Now, that memory was just another ghost, a painful reminder of the beautiful lie I had lived. The man who promised me a forever home had turned our first home into a prison, a stage for my deepest humiliation.

The warmth of that memory was instantly extinguished by the cold reality of the man standing in front of me now.

"Our plans changed, Ethan," I said, my voice flat and devoid of all emotion. "They changed the night you slept with my best friend."