Chapter 3 my world fell apart in real time.

"You know what's truly delicious about all this, Ava?"

Sophia's voice was silk wrapped around a knife as she circled me like a hunter who'd cornered her prey. The marble statues watched with stone eyes as my world fell apart in real time.

"Marcus has had me wrapped around his finger for years, but it's you he's kept on a chain. All those nights you waited up like a faithful little dog?" Her laugh was crystal-clear cruelty. "He was with me, learning what a real woman can offer."

Each word hit like a punch, but I stayed standing. Barely.

"What did you say?" The question escaped as barely a whisper, tears streaming down my cheeks like acid.

"Oh, sweet naive Ava." Those designer heels clicked against marble-a countdown to my destruction. "You can't even give him a child, can you? How pathetic must that feel, knowing you're completely useless to a man like Marcus?"

My hand moved without thinking to my stomach.

The secret growing there. The one that changed everything.

"Marcus is fed up with your empty body, dear sister." Sophia's smile could have cut glass. "He's a billionaire raised in luxury-of course he wants an heir. But don't worry." She leaned closer, her perfume choking me. "When I'm pregnant with Marcus's child, you'll be the first to know."

"Sophia!" The scream tore from somewhere deep in my chest, raw and animal. "You're shameless! Even after destroying my life, you're still not satisfied?"

I swatted her reaching hand away-barely touched her-but she stumbled backward with a dramatic cry worthy of the theater.

"Ava!"

Footsteps thundered toward us. Marcus appeared like an angry angel, his face twisted with fury and disgust that made my blood turn to ice water.

"What the hell are you doing?!" His glare could have stripped skin from bone. "Why did you hurt Sophia?!"

"I-It's alright, Marcus." Sophia's tears flowed on command, perfect crystal drops that caught the gallery lighting. "Ava was just upset. Please don't be angry with her... I'm fine."

The performance was flawless.

"I'm asking you, Ava!" Marcus's voice echoed off marble walls like thunder. "Why did you attack your sister?!"

"I didn't... I never pushed her..." The words trembled out of me as I felt the weight of staring eyes. His colleagues had appeared like vultures sensing death, their phones already recording my shame for everyone to see.

My destruction, brought to you in high definition.

Marcus bent down and lifted Sophia into his arms-held her like she was made of spun glass and starlight. The protective way he held her, the tender concern that lived in his eyes... I'd never seen him look at me like that. Not once in three years of marriage.

The pain was so sharp I couldn't breathe.

"Let's just leave, Marcus." Sophia's voice cracked with perfectly fake weakness. "Ava is my little sister... she's always been difficult. I don't want her embarrassed." She pressed her face against his shoulder like a broken bird seeking shelter. "We shouldn't make a scene."

Marcus's jaw clenched as he noticed the phones, the whispered conversations. His carefully built public image cracking in real time.

"Ava. Follow me. Now."

The command left no room for argument. I followed like a puppet whose strings were pulled by a master, my body moving even as my heart shattered with each step.

But instead of taking Sophia to her fancy apartment, Marcus led us to a small storage room. My old bedroom in our parent mansion. The place where I'd slept on the floor during those first brutal months in his world, grateful for any shelter from the storm of his family's rejection.

The room now served as Sophia's overflow closet-designer gowns scattered carelessly among boxes of medical journals and awards. Even here, she'd claimed what had once been mine.

"The first aid kit is in the back," Sophia said sweetly, settling onto the small chair like a queen holding court. "Ava, could you bring it for me?"

"Why should she?" Marcus snapped, but his anger wasn't for her. Never for her. "That's the least she can do after ruining your homecoming!"

My vision blurred as I watched my husband position himself between me and Sophia like I was the threat in this room. Like I was dangerous instead of dying inside.

Even knowing everything-the affairs, the lies, the three years of elaborate deception-my body still moved to obey him. Years of training were impossible to break in a single night.

When I returned with the kit, Sophia was curled against Marcus's chest, her sobs painting me as the villain in their tragic love story.

Marcus grabbed my wrist hard enough to leave fingerprint bruises. "Ava, massage Sophia's feet. Now. It's your fault she's hurt. Do you have any idea what you've done?"

While his attention was on me, Sophia's tears magically stopped. A small, winning smirk replaced them-the expression of a chess master who'd just achieved checkmate.

"I will not do it."

The words came from somewhere deep inside me. Some part that refused to break completely.

"What did you say?"

"I will not do it!"

His explosion was swift and brutal. Marcus shoved me down, and I hit the concrete floor hard, instinctively curling around my stomach as terror bloomed in every cell. The tiny life I was protecting-what if-

"Do you even know how to behave like a proper wife?!" He towered over me like an angry god. "How dare you tell Sophia she stole everything when you can't do a single thing right! Even if you had everything she has, you'd still end up unloved and alone!"

"Marcus!" I screamed through my tears, his words crushing what remained of my heart into powder.

If the bed hadn't been there to catch me, I would have fallen completely. The thought of what might have happened to my babies made fear explode through every nerve ending.

"Marcus, stop!" Sophia's voice cut through his rage, but calculation lurked behind her concern. "I'm the true daughter of the Harrison family, and Ava is adopted. I took our parents' love, made our brothers avoid her... it's natural for her to feel hurt. What if she was injured-"

"It's because she deserves all of it!" Marcus's words were final, absolute. "Every bit of pain, every moment of loneliness-she's earned it all!"

Something fundamental broke inside me hearing those words from the man I'd loved with everything I had.

This was who I'd married. This was the father of my children.

"Sister, are you alright?" Sophia's fake concern was the final straw. "Please get up. Marcus was just angry. You know he didn't mean it, right?"

"Shut up!" Years of suppressed rage exploded from me like a dam bursting. "Just shut up with your crocodile tears and fake sisterly act!"

The crack of his palm across my face echoed like a gunshot.

My cheek burned, but the betrayal in that strike cut deeper than any physical pain. I pressed my fingers to the stinging spot, tasting blood where my teeth had cut my lip.

"How dare you speak to Sophia that way!" His voice was deadly quiet now-more terrifying than shouting. "She's shown you nothing but kindness."

I looked up at him through my tears. This man I'd worshipped, this stranger wearing my husband's face.

The perfect mask had finally slipped completely.

"Kindness?" I laughed, the sound broken and bitter as winter wind. "Is that what you call sleeping with my husband behind my back? Is that kindness-destroying my marriage for sport?"

Sophia's gasp was pure theater. "Ava! How could you say such horrible things? Marcus, she's not well-"

"I know exactly what I saw." I pushed myself to my feet despite the pain shooting through my body. "The hotel rooms. The matching necklaces. Three years of elaborate lies." My voice grew stronger with each word, fed by fury instead of fear. "I know about everything."

Marcus went white, then red with rage. "You're delusional. Paranoid. This is exactly why-"

"Why what? Why you had to find comfort in my sister's bed?" I met his eyes without flinching. "At least be man enough to admit it. At least give me that much truth."

Silence stretched between us like a chasm opening in the earth. Something flickered across his features-not guilt or regret, but calculation. He was weighing options, deciding how much truth he could afford.

"Fine." His voice was winter itself. "You want the truth? Here it is. Sophia gives me what you never could-passion, intelligence, a partner worthy of my position. You're nothing but a convenient arrangement that's outlived its usefulness."

The words should have destroyed me. A week ago, they would have.

But now, with new life growing inside me and Dominic's voice on the bridge reminding me I was worth saving, they felt like freedom.

"Then we're done," I said quietly. "This arrangement is over."

I walked toward the door, my steps steady despite the wreckage scattered around my feet.

"Where do you think you're going?" Marcus's voice cracked like a whip.

I turned back one last time. Looked at the man who'd been my whole world and the sister who'd helped him destroy it.

The sound wasn't what I expected. Not the sharp crack I'd heard in movies, but something duller-like a book slamming shut. Marcus's hand connected with my cheek for the second time, and for a heartbeat, the world went completely still.

Then the heat bloomed across my skin.

I blinked, more from shock than pain. My hand drifted upward without permission, fingertips finding the tender spot where his palm had branded me. The sting was nothing compared to the way my chest hollowed out, like someone had reached inside and carved away everything I thought I knew about us.