986 Nights of Betrayal

For 986 nights, my marriage bed had not been my own.

My husband, Corbett Ewing, heir to a New York real estate empire, was haunted by a ghost, and that ghost' s sister, Ivana, was my tormentor. Every night, she' d scratch at our door, claiming nightmares, and Corbett would let her in, laying a spare duvet for her in our master bedroom.

One night, Ivana shrieked, pointing at me, "She tried to kill me! She snuck in while I was sleeping and choked me!"

Corbett, without a second thought, yelled at me, "Jenna! What did you do?" He didn' t even look at me for my side of the story.

Later, he tried to apologize with a macaron, my favorite pistachio. But it was filled with almond paste, to which I was deathly allergic.

As my throat closed up and my vision tunneled, Ivana shrieked again, claiming a panic attack over online comments. Corbett, faced with my dying gasps and her fake hysterics, chose her. He carried her away, leaving me alone to save myself.

He never came back to the hospital. He sent his assistant to discharge me. When I returned home, he tried to appease me, but then asked me to give my father' s last gift, my perfume organ, to Ivana for her "design studio."

I refused, but he took it anyway. The next morning, Ivana "accidentally" shattered a bottle of my father' s custom scent, the last physical piece of him I had.

I looked at Corbett, my hands bleeding, my heart shattered. He pulled Ivana behind him, shielding her from me, his voice cold, "That' s enough, Jenna. You' re hysterical. You' re upsetting Ivana."

In that moment, the last shred of hope died.

I was done.

I accepted an offer to be a head perfumer in France, renewed my passport, and planned my escape.

Chapter 1

It was the 986th night.

For 986 nights, my marriage bed had not been my own. It had not truly been ours.

The sound was faint at first, a soft scratching at the mahogany door of our master bedroom. It was a sound I knew better than my own heartbeat.

My husband, Corbett Ewing, stirred beside me. He was the heir to a New York real estate empire, a man whose name was etched onto half the skyscrapers in the city. But in this room, he was just a man haunted by a ghost.

"Jenna," he whispered, his voice thick with sleep and a familiar, weary dread. "She' s here."

I didn' t answer. I just kept my eyes closed, pretending to be asleep. It was a useless defense I had perfected over the last three years.

The door creaked open.

A small figure, shrouded in a silk robe that belonged to Corbett' s dead fiancée, Elenor, slipped inside. This was Ivana Manning, Elenor' s younger sister. My sister-in-law in spirit, my tormentor in reality.

She clutched a lace-trimmed pillow to her chest. It was Elenor' s pillow. Ivana claimed it was the only thing that helped her sleep, the only thing that kept the nightmares of her sister' s death at bay.

The first time she did this, almost three years ago, I had screamed. Corbett had been furious, not at me, but at her.

"Ivana, this is unacceptable," he had said, his voice firm as he stood between her and our bed. "This is my wife' s room. Our room."

He had marched her out and, the next day, cut off her credit cards.

That night, Ivana had a panic attack so severe that Corbett had to call an ambulance. The doctors said her PTSD was dangerously triggered by the stress.

The next night, the scratching at the door returned.

This time, Corbett didn' t send her away. He sighed, a sound heavy with guilt, and got out of bed.

"Just for tonight, Jen," he' d pleaded with me. "Her anxiety is through the roof."

He had laid a spare duvet and a fresh pillow on the chaise lounge in the corner of our room.

Tonight, like every night for the past 985, he did the same. He rose from our bed, the mattress shifting under his weight, and walked to the closet to retrieve the bedding he now kept ready for her. He didn' t even look at me anymore. He knew I was awake. He just chose to ignore it.

Ivana watched him with wide, tear-filled eyes, a perfect portrait of a fragile, broken girl. She was twenty-three, but she played the part of a terrified child.

I used to feel something. Anger. Humiliation. Desperation. Now, I just felt a deep, hollow coldness. The love I had for Corbett, once a blazing fire, was now a bed of dying embers.

He gently led her to the chaise lounge, tucking the duvet around her.

"It' s okay, Vana," he murmured, his voice soft, the voice he rarely used with me anymore. "You' re safe here."

She clutched his hand. "Corbett, I had the dream again. The crash. Elenor... she was calling for me."

I heard the lie. I had heard it a thousand times. But Corbett, he heard the echo of his own guilt.

Elenor had died in a car crash five years ago, pushing him out of the way of an oncoming truck just before impact. She had saved his life and, in doing so, had shackled him to her memory forever. His guilt was the chain, and Ivana held the key.

He knelt by her side, stroking her hair. "I' m here. I promised Elenor I would always take care of you. I won' t let anything happen to you."

His words were a familiar blade twisting in my gut. He was my husband. He had made vows to me. But his promise to a dead woman always came first.

I finally opened my eyes and sat up, the silk of my nightgown feeling foreign against my skin. "Corbett."

He flinched, turning to look at me. In the dim light from the hallway, I could see the conflict in his eyes. He loved me, or at least, he said he did. But he was weak, and Ivana had preyed on that weakness until it became the defining feature of our marriage.

"Jenna, please," he begged. "Not tonight. She' s not well."

I didn' t look at Ivana. I couldn' t. I looked at the man I married, the man who had once looked at me as if I were the sun. Now, I was just a complication in his penance.

I remembered our wedding day. He' d held my hands and told me, "You' re my second chance, Jenna. You' ve brought the light back into my life."

I had believed him. I had thought my love could heal him. I was a fool. He didn' t want healing. He wanted a substitute for Elenor, and I, with my similar blonde hair and quiet demeanor, had fit the part. When it became clear I was my own person, not a ghost, Ivana began her siege.

She had started small. "Accidentally" spilling red wine on my wedding dress, which she' d asked to see. "Forgetting" my severe allergy to shellfish and serving it at a family dinner. Framing me for the theft of a family heirloom. Each time, Corbett would get angry, then Ivana would have a breakdown, and he would forgive her, begging me to do the same for the sake of her "fragile mental state."

I got out of bed and walked to the bathroom, my feet cold on the marble floor. I shut the door, the click of the lock a small, pathetic act of defiance.

I leaned against the sink, my reflection a pale, tired stranger. I couldn' t go on like this.

I pulled out my phone. An email sat in my inbox, unread for the third time. It was an offer from Kain Solomon, the owner of a legendary perfume house in Grasse, France. He had been a judge at a competition I' d entered before I married Corbett. He' d said my talent was generational. The offer was for a position as their head perfumer. It was a lifeline.

My escape.

My finger hovered over the "accept" button. I just needed to be brave enough to press it.

Suddenly, a piercing shriek ripped through the silence from the bedroom.

"Aaaah! Get off me!"

My heart stopped. I threw the bathroom door open and ran back in.

Ivana was on the floor, thrashing, her hands clawing at her own throat. She was looking directly at me, her eyes wide with a terrifying, theatrical fear.

"She did it!" Ivana screamed, pointing a shaking finger at me. "She tried to kill me! She snuck in while I was sleeping and choked me!"

I froze, my mind struggling to process the blatant lie. I had been in the bathroom.

Corbett was already by Ivana' s side, his face a mask of panic and fury. He didn' t even look at me for my side of the story. He just looked at me with raw disappointment.

"Jenna! What did you do?" he yelled, his voice cracking.

"Nothing!" I said, my voice shaking. "Corbett, I was in the bathroom. You know I was."

Ivana started sobbing, great, theatrical gasps for air. "She hates me because I look like Elenor! She wants to erase every part of her from your life!"

Corbett scooped her up, holding her like a broken doll. He glared at me over her shoulder, his eyes cold.

"Apologize to her," he said, his voice low and dangerous.

"What?" I whispered, disbelief washing over me.

"I said, apologize. Now." He cradled Ivana, soothing her, while his gaze condemned me.

In that moment, watching him protect my tormentor, the last ember of my love for him finally went out. It wasn't a flicker. It was an instant, silent death, leaving nothing but cold, hard ash.

The sound of the front door closing echoed through the silent penthouse. Corbett had taken Ivana to the emergency room, just in case. It was a routine he knew well. My heart, which should have been racing with anger, felt strangely calm. It was the calm of a battlefield after the war is lost.

This home, our home, felt like a museum of a life that was never really mine. The paintings on the walls were Elenor' s favorites. The grand piano in the living room was the one she used to play. Even the scent of the lilies that the housekeeper placed in the vase every morning was her signature flower.

I walked back into the master bedroom. The duvet Corbett had laid out for Ivana was crumpled on the floor. Her lace-trimmed pillow, Elenor' s pillow, was still on the chaise lounge, a smug monument to her victory.

Corbett' s order from last night hung in the air. "Apologize." He hadn' t believed me. He never did.

He had also given me a punishment before he left. "Clean this room. And when I get back, I want to see that you' ve thrown out all those cheap-smelling oils of yours. The smell gives Ivana a headache."

My perfumes. My work. My passion. He called them cheap-smelling oils.

I walked over to my perfume organ, a beautiful tiered desk that held hundreds of tiny bottles of essential oils and absolutes. It was my sanctuary. A gift from my father, a perfumer himself, before he passed away.

My hands trembled as I began to pack them away, not to throw them out, but to save them. Each bottle held a memory, a piece of my soul. I couldn' t let him destroy this too.

I finished just as the sun began to rise. I was exhausted, but I couldn' t rest. I needed to find Corbett. I needed to see his face when he wasn' t under Ivana' s spell. A small, stupid part of me still hoped he would realize his mistake.

I called his phone. It went straight to voicemail. I called the hospital. The nurse said Mr. Ewing had been there but had left hours ago with his sister-in-law, who was perfectly fine.

A sick feeling churned in my stomach. I checked a celebrity gossip site on my phone, my fingers shaking.

There it was. A photo, time-stamped just an hour ago. Corbett and Ivana, not at the hospital, but at an exclusive all-night patisserie downtown. He was smiling, feeding her a croissant, his eyes full of the gentle affection he once reserved for me. The caption read: "Real estate mogul Corbett Ewing dotes on his fragile sister-in-law Ivana Manning after a late-night health scare. Is there more to this story?"

The maids were starting to move around the penthouse, their hushed whispers following me. I could feel their pity. Mrs. Ewing, the woman who had to clean her own room while her husband was out on a public date with his dead fiancée' s sister. The humiliation was a physical weight.

I placed the packed boxes of my perfume oils by the service elevator, telling the head butler they were donations. It was a lie, but it was the only way to get them out of the house safely. A friend would pick them up later.

I was clearing out the last of our shared things from a closet when Corbett finally came home. He found me holding a photo album from our honeymoon.

"What are you doing, Jen?" he asked, his voice soft, as if nothing had happened.

"Cleaning," I said, my voice flat. I tossed the album into a large garbage bag. "Getting rid of junk."

"Junk?" He looked hurt. "Those are our memories."

Ivana appeared behind him, clinging to his arm like a vine. "Corbett, my head still hurts. Can you make me some tea?"

She looked at me, her eyes glinting with triumph. She was wearing one of his expensive cashmere sweaters, and it hung off her small frame, making her look even more childlike and vulnerable.

"In a minute, Vana," Corbett said, his eyes still on me. He seemed genuinely confused by my coldness.

"But I need it now," she whined, her lower lip trembling. "The doctor said I need to stay calm."

He sighed, torn. It was a pathetic sight. He turned to go with her, then paused. "We' ll talk later, Jenna."

I said nothing. I just watched them walk away, his arm wrapped protectively around her. I dragged the garbage bag full of our "memories" to the incinerator chute and sent it down without a second thought.

Later that evening, he found me in the library. He brought me a small plate of macarons from the same patisserie he' d taken Ivana to.

"A peace offering," he said, a charming smile on his face.

I looked at the plate. "Did you apologize to her?"

His smile faltered. "Jenna, let' s not talk about that. It was a stressful night for everyone."

"Did she apologize to me?" I pressed, my voice still quiet. "For lying? For accusing me of trying to kill her?"

"She' s not well," he said, the familiar excuse sounding hollow even to his own ears. "You know her PTSD... she gets confused. She thinks she' s in danger."

"So you punished me for her delusion."

"I didn' t punish you," he said, his voice rising in frustration. "I just asked you to be considerate of her condition. I did ground her, you know. She' s not allowed to go shopping for a whole week."

A whole week. The punishment was so laughable, so insulting, that a dry, humorless laugh escaped my lips. Out in the hallway, I could see Ivana lounging on a sofa, scrolling through her phone, not a care in the world.

"I see," I said, my voice dripping with sarcasm. "How ever will she survive?"

I took one of the macarons from the plate. It was pistachio, my favorite. A flavor he remembered. For a moment, a flicker of the old Corbett seemed to be there. I put it in my mouth.

The taste was perfect. Sweet, nutty, delicate.

And then the itching started.

My throat began to close up. My skin erupted in hives. My breath came in ragged, panicked wheezes.

Pistachios. I wasn' t allergic to them.

But I was severely, life-threateningly allergic to almonds. And this macaron, this peace offering, was filled with almond paste.

Corbett' s eyes widened in horror as he saw my face swell, my skin turn red. "Jenna! Oh my God, Jenna!"

He fumbled for his phone to call 911. At the same moment, Ivana let out a piercing shriek from the hallway.

"Corbett! The internet! They' re saying horrible things about you and me! They' re calling me a homewrecker! I can' t breathe! I' m having another panic attack!"

She crumpled to the floor, sobbing hysterically.

Corbett' s head snapped back and forth between me, gasping for air on the library floor, and Ivana, putting on the performance of a lifetime in the hall.

He looked at me, his eyes full of panic and indecision. "Jenna, I..."

Then he turned and ran to Ivana.

"It' s okay, Vana, don' t look at it. I' m here," he soothed, pulling her into his arms. He chose her. He chose to comfort her fake panic attack while my throat was closing, while I was dying.

As my vision started to tunnel, the last thing I saw was Corbett carrying Ivana away, leaving me alone on the floor. My hand, swollen and red, reached for my purse, for the EpiPen I always carried. I was alone. I had to save myself.

And in that moment of pure, agonizing betrayal, I remembered a time when he would have moved mountains for me. A time when I' d had a mild allergic reaction at a restaurant, and he had carried me to the car himself, breaking every traffic law to get me to the hospital, never leaving my side. That man was gone. Or maybe he had never really existed at all.

The fluorescent lights of the hospital room were harsh and unforgiving. I was alive, no thanks to my husband. The paramedics had arrived just in time, responding to my own choked 911 call.

My throat was raw, and my body ached from the violent reaction. But the physical pain was nothing compared to the gaping wound in my soul. He had left me. He had chosen her.

I picked up my phone, my hand still slightly swollen, and tried to call him. The first time, it rang and rang before going to voicemail. The second time, someone picked up.

"Hello?" It was Ivana' s voice, sickly sweet.

A cold rage, so pure and sharp it almost made me gasp, surged through me.

"Where is Corbett?" I asked, my voice a hoarse whisper.

"Oh, Jenna, you' re awake!" she chirped. "Corbett is just so worried about me. The stress of your... episode... really set my recovery back. He' s sleeping now. He was up all night taking care of me."

I didn' t say anything. I just squeezed the phone, my knuckles turning white.

"You really should be more careful, you know," Ivana continued, her voice dripping with false concern. "It' s so selfish to put everyone through that. Corbett was terrified."

I hung up. I couldn' t listen to another word. I threw the phone across the room, and it shattered against the wall. The action did nothing to quell the storm inside me. I yanked the IV out of my arm, ignoring the sharp sting and the bead of blood that welled up. I had to get out of there.

I was signing my own discharge papers, against medical advice, when he finally showed up.

Corbett rushed into the room, his face a mess of concern. "Jenna! What are you doing? You' re not well enough to leave."

He tried to hug me, but I flinched away from his touch. His arms dropped to his sides, and he looked lost.

"Why didn' t you answer your phone?" I asked, my voice devoid of emotion.

"I... my phone was on silent. I was with Ivana, she..."

"I know where you were," I cut him off. "She told me. She also told me how selfish I was to have an allergic reaction."

His face paled. "Jenna, she doesn' t mean it. She' s just..."

"Fragile," I finished for him. "I know."

Just then, his phone rang, the shrill sound cutting through the tense silence. He glanced at the screen. The caller ID read "Ivana' s Nurse."

He looked at me, his eyes pleading. "I have to take this."

He answered, and his entire demeanor shifted. "What? She pulled out her stitches? Is she okay? I' ll be right there."

He hung up and turned to me, his face etched with worry. "I have to go. Ivana tried to hurt herself."

He was choosing her again. Even after she' d nearly killed me and he had abandoned me, he was still choosing her. The pattern was so predictable it was almost boring.

"I' ll come right back, Jen," he promised, his hand on the doorknob. "I swear. We' ll sort this out."

"Don' t bother," I said.

He hesitated for a second, then rushed out of the room, leaving me alone once more.

The next few days were a blur of media headlines. Corbett Ewing was lauded as a hero, a devoted guardian to his tragic sister-in-law. There were pictures of him taking her on a shopping spree to cheer her up. Pictures of them throwing coins into the fountain at Lincoln Center, a place he had once taken me on our first anniversary. Pictures of him holding her hand as they walked through Central Park. He was re-creating my memories with her.

And me? I was the villain. The cruel, jealous wife who couldn' t stand the sight of her husband' s charity. The tabloids tore me apart.

Corbett never came back to the hospital. He sent his assistant to handle my discharge and drive me home.

When I walked back into the penthouse, he was waiting for me. He had filled the living room with my favorite flowers, white gardenias. He had a private chef making my favorite meal. He was trying to apologize without ever saying the words.

He pulled me into an embrace, burying his face in my hair. "I missed you, Jen. The house felt so empty without you."

His touch felt like a violation. I stood stiffly in his arms.

He pulled back, searching my face. "Let me take care of you. Let me make it up to you."

He led me to the dining table, pulling out my chair. He served me himself, his movements full of a practiced, empty tenderness.

As he sat down, he reached across the table and took my hand. "I' ve been thinking. I think it' s time for Ivana to find her own place."

I looked at him, surprised. Was this it? Was he finally waking up?

"But," he continued, his grip tightening on my hand, "she' s having a hard time. The memories of Elenor are so strong in her family' s old apartment. She was wondering... she wants to redecorate it, to make it new. She needs some inspiration."

My heart sank. I knew what was coming.

"She loves your perfume organ," he said, his eyes avoiding mine. "She thinks it' s beautiful. She wants to use it as a centerpiece in her new design studio. Just for a little while. To... inspire her."

He wanted to give her my father' s last gift to me. The most precious thing I owned.

"No," I said, my voice quiet but firm.

"Jenna, please," he pleaded. "It would mean so much to her. It would help her heal. It' s the last step. After this, she' ll move out, and we can be us again."

"I said no, Corbett."

He stood up, his chair scraping against the floor. "It' s just a desk, Jenna! Why are you being so difficult? After everything I do for her, for my promise to Elenor, you can' t do this one small thing?"

"It' s not just a desk," I said, my voice rising. "It was my father' s."

"And Elenor was my future!" he shot back, his face twisting in anguish. "I owe her this! I owe her everything!"

The argument was pointless. I was tired. So incredibly tired.

"Fine," I said, the word tasting like poison. "Do whatever you want."

I stood up and walked away, leaving him standing there amidst the gardenias and the gourmet food. I went to my studio, my sanctuary.

Later that night, I was awakened by a noise from downstairs. A scraping, dragging sound.

I crept out of my room and looked down the grand staircase.

Ivana was there, in the main foyer, directing two movers. And with them, my perfume organ. She was standing over it, her hands caressing the dark wood, a triumphant smirk on her face.

Corbett was there too, watching from the doorway, his expression a mixture of guilt and resignation. He saw me standing on the stairs, but he did nothing. He just watched as they carried away the last piece of my heart.