Her grin stretched wider, wicked and gleaming with triumph.
“You pathetic little thing,” she purred. “Still holding onto scraps of hope as if they were ever worth anything.”
My throat tightened, but I forced words out through the shaking.
“How? How did you and Dominic even manage this? All those months—you pretending to be my surrogate. All those fabricated stories. Were you laughing at me behind closed doors the entire time?”
She shrugged, slow and poised, as though she were delivering a performance.
“Oh, darling, you should ask Dominic. He was the one spoon-feeding you the fantasy, night after night.”
Then she leaned in, lowering her voice until it dripped like poison into my ear.
“But between us? Playing you was child’s play.”
“You lied to me,” I whispered, trembling.
Her smirk sharpened. “Not a lie. A role. I acted. You chose to swallow it whole because you were starving for it.”
My chest threatened to cave in. I wanted to scream, to shake her until her smugness shattered, to claw the grin off her face. But my body betrayed me—I stood motionless, unraveling thread by fragile thread.
Her hand caressed her swollen belly in a slow circle.
“This life,” she said, her tone almost reverent, “was never meant for you. This is ours—mine and Dominic’s. Conceived in passion, built on real desire. The kind of fire he only pretended to feel with you.”
The world tilted. I should’ve hurled something at her. Should’ve silenced her with my hand. Instead, I stared, rage hardening into something even heavier—sorrow, perhaps.
She leaned closer, lips curling. “Do you really think Dominic stayed because of you? His loyalty is to blood. Not to broken promises… and certainly not to barren wives.”
I left before the fury in my bones dragged me into something I couldn’t undo.
---
That afternoon, the air itself felt different—dense, threatening, like the house was holding its breath. I sensed the coming storm before it began.
“Dominic!” she called suddenly, her voice deliberately loud, carrying down the hallways where staff lingered. “Your miserable wife can’t stop staring at me. She keeps glaring at my stomach like she wishes the baby would disappear!”
I froze, heat flooding my chest. “Don’t start with me.”
She cocked her head, mock pity dripping from every syllable. “What’s wrong? Jealous that I slip into your clothes better than you ever managed?”
My fists tightened until my nails cut into my palms. “You’re delusional.”
She glided forward, smile stretching wider, crueler. “Be grateful Dominic didn’t toss you aside years ago. Most men wouldn’t have tolerated such a broken woman past the second year of disappointment.”
Something inside me snapped clean in two.
I stepped forward, close enough for her to see the fire in my eyes. I didn’t touch her. I swear I didn’t.
“You don’t have the right to speak about things you’ll never comprehend.”
But her gasp pierced the air. She stumbled back, collapsed to her knees with a practiced sob, clutching her stomach as if struck.
“Dominic! She shoved me! The baby—oh God, it hurts!”
My heart stopped. “What? That’s a lie, I didn’t—”
And then Dominic came thundering into the room.
Time fractured into pieces.
He saw her trembling on the ground, crying into her hands. He saw me standing above her, my hands trembling, my face twisted in shock.
“What have you done?” His voice was low, monstrous, unrecognizable.
“I never touched her—”
“Enough!” he roared. “You couldn’t bear it, could you? That my legacy, my future, is inside another woman.”
Tears blurred my vision. “Dominic, listen to me—”
But he didn’t.
Daniela clung to him like a child, burying her face into his chest, wailing. “She hates the baby! She said she wanted it gone—dead!”
Every word was venom. Lies, all of it. But the walls swallowed my protests.
Dominic’s gaze burned through me. He really looked at me then, as if seeing me for the first time in weeks.
And then his hand struck.
It was fast. Brutal. A crack across my face that split the air. My head whipped sideways, pain exploding white-hot. Blood gushed from my nose, filling my mouth with iron. My lip tore against my teeth. The marble floor blurred as the room spun violently out of control.
I staggered backward, barely catching myself.
Daniela’s theatrical cry rose again. “Dominic! No—don’t hurt her. She’s confused, she’s sick… maybe we should—”
“Enough,” he growled, his eyes still locked on me. “She hurt you. No one hurts my woman.”
My stomach lurched.
His woman.
Not me.
Her.
Blood dripped from my chin, warm against my freezing skin. The copper taste mixed with betrayal until I thought I might choke.
“She’s not well,” Daniela whispered, her false sympathy slithering through the air. “But tossing her out? It’s freezing tonight…”
His jaw set like stone. “Let her feel it. Throw her out!”
The guards obeyed without hesitation.
This time, they didn’t guide me—they dragged me. My feet scraped against the polished floor. My fingers clawed desperately at the walls, catching for one last anchor, but there was none.
The night swallowed me whole.
The door slammed shut with the cruel finality of a tomb.
The wind howled, merciless, carrying icy shards that sliced through my skin. Snow had begun to fall—slow at first, then thick, heavy flakes, burying the world in silence.
I had no shoes. No coat. Only the thin sweater—the same one Daniela had flaunted that morning—now soaked and heavy as snow clung to it.
Each breath seared like knives. Blood streamed down my face, freezing on my skin. The trees doubled, blurred, as I stumbled step by step across the frozen ground.
Once, my knees gave out. Then again. But I crawled forward.
Lights flickered in the distance, hazy and unreachable.
I had been Lorraine Beaumont. Now I was no one.
The road bent. My vision collapsed.
Headlights tore through the night—blinding, merciless, too fast to stop.
Impact.
Metal screamed. My body lifted, shattered, and crashed against the frozen ground with a sound that split the silence. Blood spread across the snow, blooming like an unholy flower.
Through the frost-fogged window of the estate, Dominic turned.
He saw me. My body twisted, bloodied, broken.
“Lorraine!” His voice cracked as he lunged for the door.
But before he reached me—
Daniela’s shriek filled the halls. She bent over, clutching her stomach, her face contorted.
“Dominic! The baby—it’s coming! Oh God, I think I’m in labor!”
