Even on our anniversary—a date he'd remembered without fail for twenty years.
Jewelry. Designer bags. Every gift had once been proof of our love, trophies I'd shown off with pride.
Now they were just evidence of how thoroughly Duke had deceived me.
My mother noticed me wasting away and assumed we'd had a fight.
"Delilah, every couple bickers now and then."
"I know that boy. You're the only one in his heart. Just be patient with him."
I lowered my gaze, terrified she'd see the tears threatening to spill.
Patient?
How do you forgive betrayal?
The door swung open. Duke walked in carrying a fruit basket.
He peeled an apple for my mother with practiced ease, his voice warm and gentle—as if nothing had happened.
"Mom, Delilah's just throwing a little tantrum. I'm here to take her home."
He even pulled Brandon forward, addressing my mother in her hospital bed. "Once you're feeling better, we'll all visit Grandma's grave together—the three of us."
My mother's face lit up. She waved me off. "Stop being stubborn. Go home with Duke."
Under her hopeful gaze, I extended my hand and let him take it.
His palm was warm. It felt like a viper coiling around my wrist.
The moment we stepped into the hallway, he dropped my hand like it burned.
"Delilah." His voice went flat. "For your mother's sake, I won't divorce you."
"But you will behave. You'll treat Brandon as your own son."
I lifted my chin. "Duke, it's not like I can't have children."
He laughed.
"Actually, you can't."
Every muscle in my body locked.
He watched me with detached calm.
"Last month, during your appendectomy? I had the surgeon remove your fallopian tubes while he was in there."
"You will never have a child of your own."
The world tilted. Ice flooded my veins, freezing me from the inside out.
Duke stepped closer. He reached up and stroked my hair—the same tender gesture he'd made a thousand times before.
"I want to spend my life with you, Delilah. I really do."
"But I can't gamble on human nature."
"This way, you'll have no choice but to pour all your love into Brandon."
Something inside me shattered. I pointed at the boy slouched against the wall, absorbed in his phone.
"For him?" My voice cracked. "You did this for him?"
Duke nodded.
"I have to take responsibility for my mistakes. That girl back then—I lied to her too."
I couldn't breathe. An invisible fist had closed around my heart and was squeezing, squeezing.
Duke pulled me into his arms.
"I love you, Delilah. That's why I'm telling you the truth instead of hiding it."
"Let's just go back to how things were. Live our lives. Isn't that enough?"
In that embrace—the one I'd once craved more than anything—I felt myself suffocating.
His lips brushed my ear.
"There's a new targeted therapy overseas. It could really help your mother. But it's expensive."
"Be good for me, and I'll find a way to pay for it. Okay?"
I couldn't tell if I was exhausted or destroyed. Either way, I nodded.
I became exactly what Duke wanted: the obedient wife, the devoted mother.
I cleaned Brandon's room. Washed his clothes. Cooked his favorite meals.
Duke was pleased. On weekends, he'd take us out together—the picture-perfect family of three.
He thought I'd surrendered.
He didn't know about the medical report tucked safely in my purse. The one diagnosing him with azoospermia.
I carried it with me everywhere. Every single day.
Brandon saved his cruelty for when Duke wasn't watching.
He spat in my soup. Ground his new sneakers into my skirt. Waited until I'd finished mopping to spill juice across the floor.
I cleaned it up without a flicker of expression.
