My Ex-Husband's Regret: The Surgeon's Return

Felicity Roman POV:

I had just survived a grueling thirty-hour surgical rotation and was on the verge of collapsing at the scrub sink when my husband, Garold Peck, suddenly kicked open the emergency room doors carrying Karlie with a twisted ankle, demanding I get out there immediately to treat her.

"Dr. Roman, he looks like he's going to tear the building down!" Nurse supervisor Sarah was practically in tears, her voice a panicked whisper.

I stared blankly at my bloodshot eyes in the mirror, snapped a pair of purple surgical gloves over my raw knuckles, and said, "I'll handle it," before pushing through the double doors.

Even from ten yards away, the air around the triage desk felt stripped of oxygen.

Garold stood like an oppressive iron wall in the center of the corridor. His massive hands-the same hands that had beaten opponents bloody on the ice-were now cradling a petite girl against his broad chest as if she were a priceless treasure.

Karlie Nguyen. A rookie model. She was swallowed up by Garold's oversized black-and-gold hockey jacket, her honey-blonde curls spilling over his collar as she let out theatrical, breathy whimpers.

Garold looked up. His pitch-black eyes cut through the flurry of terrified nurses and slammed directly into mine.

"Put the patient on the gurney, Garold," I said, my voice a dead, clinical flatline. "This is a level-one trauma center, not a red carpet."

Karlie lifted her head from his chest. Her pale blue eyes were rimmed with tears, her lower lip trembling pitifully as she looked at my white coat.

"Sister Roman... please don't be mad at Garold. It's all my fault. I was just so clumsy and twisted my ankle on the curb..."

A faint, cold smile touched the corner of my lips. "There are only attending physicians here, Ms. Nguyen. Not sisters."

Garold's dark brows drew together in a furious line. He took a step forward, casting a heavy shadow over me. "Watch your tone, Felicity. She's in severe pain."

I met his glare without blinking. "If you don't want her to develop permanent ligament damage from a lack of circulation, put her down. Or you can stand here all night playing knight in shining armor."

A sharp intake of breath rippled through the nursing staff behind the desk. No one in Boston dared to speak to the city's ruthless captain like that.

Garold stared at me, his jaw muscles grinding. Finally, he set Karlie down onto the mobile gurney.

The second her back touched the mattress, Karlie grabbed the hem of his jacket, tears spilling down her cheeks. "Garold, don't fight with the doctor because of me. As long as you're happy, I can bear it..."

I ignored the sickening performance. I stepped up to the edge of the gurney and reached out toward Karlie's right ankle.

Before my fingertips even grazed her skin, Karlie let out a soft, pitiful hiss, shrinking backward with tears instantly welling in her eyes.

Instantly, Garold's hand clamped down around my left wrist like an iron vise.

The pressure was brutal, hard enough to grind my delicate wrist bones together. A jolt of sharp, blinding pain shot up my arm.

"Can't you be gentle?!" his voice dropped to a lethal growl.

I looked down at his thick fingers wrapping around my scrub sleeve. My own husband was willing to snap my wrist over a girl's fake whimper when I hadn't even touched her.

I yanked my hand back, my voice completely devoid of emotion. "Grade one sprain of the anterior talofibular ligament. If you had driven ten minutes slower, it would have healed itself before you reached the lobby."

Karlie's face flushed a violent, blotchy red. Her fingers dug so hard into the mattress that her knuckles turned white.

"Apply an ice pack for twenty minutes," I told the junior resident, scribbling on the chart without looking back. "Give her a tube of topical Voltaren gel, and send them to the billing desk."

"Garold..." Karlie whined from the bed, her voice trembling. "My foot feels so cold. I'm scared. Can you go pay the fees for me?"

Garold Peck, the ruthless billionaire who wouldn't even bat an eye when his own ribs were fractured on the ice, the man who coldly ordered his assistant to handle his own parents' hospital bills... was now nodding softly to a greenhorn model.

"Wait here," Garold said, his voice dripping with a sickeningly sweet tenderness I hadn't heard in three years. "I'll handle it."

My chest tightened with a sudden, suffocating wave of acid. It was so absurd it was almost funny.

I turned on my heel and walked straight into the staff locker room.

I peeled off my bloody scrubs, my body aching to the bone. Just as I unclasped my hair, the heavy metal door of the locker room slammed shut. The deadbolt clicked into place.

Garold's massive, scorching body pressed against my back. He grabbed my chin roughly, forcing me to look up at him.

His pitch-black eyes were full of violent, self-righteous arrogance. "Karlie is out there crying because of your brutal attitude. She has always admired you. You are going to walk out there right now and apologize to her."

I looked at the man I had loved for three years, and a sudden, violent wave of nausea hit my stomach.

"I just spent thirty straight hours saving three human lives, and you want me to apologize to a manipulative brat who doesn't even need a Band-Aid?"

"Don't force me to humiliate you in your own hospital, Felicity," Garold's voice dripped with cruel threat. "If you don't go apologize, I will pull Peck Group's ten-million-dollar medical sponsorship from this facility tomorrow morning."

I didn't cry. I didn't even feel angry anymore.

I looked at him with absolute, dead calm, a sharp smirk curving my lips.

"Pulling a ten-million-dollar sponsorship over a scratch that doesn't even need a Band-Aid?" I met his instantly dilating pupils, my voice dripping with pure mockery. "Go ahead. Do it. I'd love to see if tomorrow's Boston headline reads: 'Bruins Captain Pulls Medical Funding to Make His Mistress Smile, Leaves City's Critical Patients to Die'."

Garold's face turned ashen.

"Now," I said, pointing at the door, "get the hell out of my locker room."

Felicity Roman POV:

By noon the next day, I woke up in my Beacon Hill brownstone. After a quick lunch, I drove to the TD Garden arena. I needed the hard copies of the team's injury assessment reports for an afternoon board meeting, which I kept safely locked in my private VIP suite.

I swiped my master access badge at the underground elevator. The doors opened to the penthouse suite level.

I walked down the hallway and pushed open the heavy walnut doors of Suite 101.

"Garold, you're finally back..." Karlie's sweet, breathy voice floated from the leather sofa.

The moment she saw my face, her bright smile froze, instantly replaced by a panicked, innocent pout.

She was sitting on my custom Italian leather sofa, wearing Garold's black-and-gold #88 Bruins jersey. It was comically oversized on her petite frame, the hem barely covering her bare thighs.

"Where is he?" I asked, my voice as cold as the ice rink below.

Karlie shrank back, her hands nervously tugging at the hem of his jersey. "Sister Roman... please don't misunderstand. My period suddenly started, and Garold was afraid I'd catch a cold, so he gave me his jersey..."

She bit her lip, looking at me with wide, doe-like eyes. "He went down to the convenience store to buy me some feminine products."

I crossed my arms, looking at her pathetic performance.

My heart didn't even ache anymore; the sheer absurdity of it all just made me want to laugh.

During our three years of marriage, there were times when my menstrual cramps were so severe I was covered in cold sweat after a grueling surgery. Garold would only frown in annoyance and tell me, "Take a painkiller and stop being so dramatic."

Yet now, the untouchable, arrogant billionaire captain was personally running errands to buy sanitary pads for his little mistress.

Footsteps echoed in the corridor behind me.

Blake, the Bruins' alternate captain and Garold's close buddy, strolled toward the open door with a disgusting smirk on his face.

"Karlie, what's taking Garold so long to buy a simple pad? Are you getting too impatient waiting for your man..."

Blake's lewd joke died in his throat the second he saw me standing in the doorway.

His face turned pale. He awkwardly cleared his throat, avoiding my eyes, and practically sprinted away down the hall like he had seen a ghost.

Karlie's face flushed red, but before she could speak, a massive figure appeared behind me.

It was Garold.

He was holding a cheap black plastic bag-undoubtedly filled with women's sanitary products.

When his pitch-black eyes landed on me, a brief flicker of genuine guilt crossed his face, but it was instantly swallowed by defensive arrogance.

"Are you following me?" he demanded, his voice dropping to a harsh rumble. "Felicity, haven't you caused enough of a scene?"

I looked at the black plastic bag in his hand, my lips curving into a mocking smile. I walked over to the built-in cabinet, unlocked it, pulled out my medical files, and turned back to him.

"I just came to get my documents. But I must say, seeing the great Captain Peck personally running errands to buy sanitary pads is truly touching."

I walked past him, pausing just enough to whisper coldly, "Just don't dirty my private suite with your cheap affairs."

Without giving him a single second to respond, I walked out and slammed the heavy walnut door shut, leaving them both behind.

Felicity Roman POV:

I took the elevator down to the garage and drove back to my Beacon Hill brownstone, forcing myself to sleep for four hours.

At ten o'clock the next morning, the sharp ringing of my phone woke me up.

The screen flashed "Elder Mr. Peck"-Garold's grandfather, the ruthless, controlling patriarch of the Peck family empire.

I answered the call, and his cold, commanding voice immediately filled the line.

"Felicity, I heard Garold made a scene at the arena last night with that little model. You are the granddaughter-in-law I personally selected. Your duty is to get pregnant with the Peck family heir as soon as possible, not to sit around uselessly while he embarrasses our name."

My fingers tightened around the phone.

"I've had the estate's kitchen prepare a fertility and anti-inflammatory meal. My driver is dropping it off at your door right now. I want you to deliver it to his headquarters personally. Control your husband, Felicity. Don't force me to step in and clean up his cheap trash myself."

The line went dead.

I stared at the black screen, a cold, self-deprecating smirk touching my lips.

To the Peck family, I was never a top-tier trauma surgeon. I was just an expensive tool meant to leash Garold and breed an heir.

I changed into a sharp, tailored black power suit, walked outside, and took the sleek white paper bag from the estate's driver.

Control him? Fine. I'd go exactly as ordered, just to see what kind of joke my husband was making of himself today.

By two o'clock in the afternoon, I was pulling into the underground executive garage of the Peck Sports Group headquarters in downtown Boston.

I carried the white paper bag up the private elevator to the executive floor.

The receptionist stood up the moment the doors opened.

"Good afternoon, Dr. Roman. Mr. Peck is in his corner office."

I walked past the glass partitions toward the corner suite.

Through the half-open blinds, the scene inside brought me to an immediate halt.

Garold was sitting behind his sprawling mahogany desk.

Karlie was leaning over the edge of the wood, a glossy contract in her manicured hands. She was leaning forward so far that the low neckline of her pastel knit top left absolutely nothing to the imagination.

"Garold, this sponsorship addendum is just so confusing," Karlie pouted, batting her eyelashes. "I'm so stupid. If only I were as smart and capable as Dr. Roman..."

Garold didn't push her away. Instead, he let out a low, relaxed chuckle-a sound I hadn't heard from him in years.

"Her? She's just a cold, rigid machine who only knows how to memorize medical charts. You're different. You're sweet."

My heart felt like it had been pierced by an ice pick.

For three years, I had stayed up countless nights researching his old injuries. I had given up a prestigious surgical fellowship in Switzerland just to oversee his rehabilitation. And in his eyes, all my sacrifices made me nothing but a "cold, rigid machine."

A wave of physical nausea rose in my throat, but my pulse didn't jump a single beat. I had shed enough tears for this man.

I stepped back from the doorway, walking over to the executive assistant's desk outside.

I placed the white paper bag on the desk with a firm, hollow thud.

Mark, Garold's chief of staff, jumped out of his swivel chair, stammering.

"M-Mrs. Peck! I didn't hear you come in. Why didn't you go inside?"

The flirting inside the corner office stopped instantly.

The heavy screech of an executive chair rolling backward echoed through the glass.

I looked at Mark, keeping my voice smooth and loud enough to carry through the open door.

"I'm just dropping off the dietary meals ordered by the Elder Mr. Peck. I wouldn't want to interrupt his grandson's urgent 'private tutoring' business."

The office door was yanked open so hard the frame rattled.

Garold stood in the doorway, his tie loosened, his dark hair messy, looking entirely out of breath.

Karlie trailed right behind him. When she saw me, her eyes flashed with momentary panic before settling into her practiced, innocent pout.

Garold stepped into the hallway, his dark gaze pinned to my face.

"Felicity? When did you get here? Why didn't you come inside?"

I pointed to the paper bag on Mark's desk with a calm, practiced smile. "I'm just fulfilling your grandfather's orders as the dutiful wife. Nothing more."

Garold's jaw clenched. He snatched the bag off the desk. "Do you have to talk to me like this? Karlie is just a rookie who doesn't understand her contract. She's very obedient and innocent. Don't target her."

Don't target her.

I looked past his shoulder, letting my gaze drift over Karlie's exposed cleavage in absolute disgust.

"Innocent? Mr. Peck, I suggest you remind your PR talent that this is the headquarters of an eight-billion-dollar sports empire, not a cheap nightclub on Boylston Street."

Karlie's face drained of color. She pressed her hand to her chest, her voice trembling. "Dr. Roman, you're misunderstanding everything..."

Across the open floor, half a dozen senior marketing vice presidents and legal analysts kept their heads down, but the complete silence in the room proved every single one of them was listening.

I looked directly into Garold's eyes, my voice perfectly level and lethal.

"And Garold, if you're so desperate to play the sugar daddy, at least remember the legal weight of the ring you keep locked in your nightstand. Don't make your cheating look so cheap."

Garold's pupils dilated sharply. His fingers crushed the paper bag until the cardboard base snapped, blue veins standing out along his forearms.

I didn't wait for him to speak.

I spun around and walked toward the elevator bank.

I stepped inside the brass car and watched the reflection of Karlie reaching out to touch Garold's elbow, only for him to violently rip his arm away from her grip.

The doors slid shut.

My phone vibrated in my pocket. The caller ID flashed "Fern Cervantes."

Fern was my best friend and one of the most sought-after haute couture designers in the country.

I answered the call. "Fern?"

"Feli, you will not believe the audacity of these people!" Fern's voice was trembling with sheer rage. "Garold's assistant just called my studio! He actually offered me double my usual rate to design a custom gown for that little side piece, Karlie, for the Museum of Fine Arts Gala tonight! He wants me to be her personal designer!"

My eyes turned to absolute ice.

"What did you tell him?" I asked, my voice deadly quiet.

"I told him to go to hell!" Fern practically screamed. "Who does he think he is? What does he take my studio for? Feli, you are coming to that gala tonight."

"Fern..."

"No excuses!" Fern demanded. "I've pulled my absolute masterpiece for you-the midnight-blue velvet gown. I want you to walk into that ballroom and slaughter them. Let that blind bastard see what a real, irreplaceable masterpiece looks like, and let him see what a cheap, pathetic knockoff he's holding onto."

I looked at my reflection in the polished brass doors. Competing with a mistress was beneath me, but Garold's arrogance in treating my best friend as his personal servant was the final straw.

"I'll be there," I said, my voice dead calm.

I hung up the phone and looked at my reflection in the polished brass doors.

It's time to end this absurd marriage too, I thought,.