My name is Naomi Swanson. I'm the other half on Elijah Gilbert's marriage certificate, and the woman he accused of leveraging a debt to trap him into marriage.
For five years, I watched him drop everything for the one that got away. Again and again. On a night of torrential rain. Outside an operating room. At my father's funeral.
Until I signed the divorce papers and quietly disappeared from his world.
Then one night, he showed up like a man unhinged, pounding on my apartment door until it gave way, eyes bloodshot, voice cracking: "Naomi Swanson, what gives you the right to throw me away?"
He would never know.
On the back of that contract he'd signed years ago to save my father's company, there was another line of writing. Words I'd put there when I was seventeen.
And this time, it was my turn to watch his empire crumble, and to burn every bridge back to me with my own two hands.
……
The day Cara Fox returned to the country was our third wedding anniversary.
I sat by the window in the restaurant, staring at a steak gone cold and candles burned down to nothing. The waiter came over for the third time, gently asking if I'd like the food boxed up.
"No, thank you."
I smiled at him, then picked up my knife and fork and cut the stiff meat into pieces, one by one, and put them in my mouth.
My phone screen lit up. A message from Elijah's assistant:
"Miss Swanson, Mr. Gilbert has been called away on an urgent matter and won't be able to make dinner tonight. The bill has been taken care of."
An urgent matter.
I opened my social media.
Three minutes ago, Cara Fox had posted a photo. Slender fingers wrapped around a whiskey glass. On her wrist was the Patek Philippe I'd given Elijah last year.
The caption was simple: "It's good to be back. Nice to know someone still remembers."
I set down my knife and fork, picked up the napkin, and slowly dabbed the corners of my mouth.
When I stepped outside, the late-autumn wind cut through the collar of my coat. A shiver ran through me before I could stop it.
My phone rang. My mother.
"Naomi, did you and Elijah have dinner? It's your third anniversary. Did he do anything special?"
Her voice was careful. Hopeful.
"We did, Mom. He gave me a necklace. It's beautiful."
I stared at my blurred reflection in a storefront window.
"Oh, good. Naomi, he does care about you, deep down. Men are just careless sometimes. Be patient with him. You have a whole life ahead of you. He'll come around."
"Mm. I know." My voice was barely above a whisper.
I hung up and sat down on a bench by the street.
Across the road, a massive LED screen on the side of a high-rise was running a Gilbert Group commercial. Elijah's face flashed across it for a moment. Composed. Polished. Untouchable.
Just like the heart I could never reach.
Elijah and I began with a transaction.
Five years ago, my father's company had its funding chain severed. Bankruptcy was days away. The only people who could save us were the Gilberts. And Old Mr. Gilbert, a man whose word was law, had one condition: a marriage alliance.
The groom would be the most accomplished grandson in the Gilbert family. Elijah Gilbert.
The man I had secretly loved for seven years.
The night before the wedding, Elijah found me. He tossed a document onto the table and looked at me with eyes that held no warmth at all.
"Naomi Swanson. Sign it. Three years. After three years, we're done. We owe each other nothing."
It was a supplementary agreement. It spelled out that my title as "Mrs. Gilbert" was to be used exclusively for public appearances where we'd play the part of a loving couple.
Rights. Obligations. Compensation. Every figure laid out in black and white.
The only thing missing was love.
I picked up the pen and signed my name at the bottom. The tip of the pen trembled, but my handwriting was neat.
"Elijah."
I looked up, fighting to keep my voice steady.
"What if... I mean, hypothetically... after three years, if things are still like this between us, could we maybe—"
"No."
