When Your Lover Surpassed You, You Destroyed Them

Paisley's POV

When I was eighteen, Geoffrey Dittman broke into my house and stabbed my father eighteen times.

As the police dragged him away, he turned to the cameras with a smile.

“Why should I regret it? From now on, no monster hiding behind the mask of family will ever hurt her again. From today, Paisley is finally free.”

Years later, when he walked out of prison, he found me broke and my job applications rejected. He crushed out his cigarette, threw himself into the business world, and came out the other side as Mr. Dittman.

After we married, every one of his passwords was set to my birthday.

But then I found his photo album with over eighteen hundred pictures of another woman and not a single one of me.

It was as if he only then realized what he had done. With a blank face, he deleted them all, tossed his phone aside, and said, “It’s over. Pretend you never saw it.”

But then, I slid the divorce papers across the table. “I told you, sign them.”

Still, he tossed the pen down and insisted, “And I told you, there will be no divorce going on between us, only death.”

——

As such, he didn’t sign.

From the very beginning, that was the promise between us: not divorce, only widowhood.

Without even glancing at the papers, he slammed the door and left.

Not long after, my phone buzzed with a voice message from an unknown number.

"You must be Paisley Sherman-Dittman. You’ve probably already seen them. He’s been keeping my photos since I was still in school. Geoffrey loves me, not you. If you don’t step aside, he’ll make you regret it."

Her voice on the recording was sweet, untouched by the world, full of naive courage. Or maybe he just kept her sheltered too well.

Before I could respond, she sent more than a dozen photos.

Her waist-to-hip curve was perfect, a chain draped across her collarbone and wrapped neatly around her waist. The huge hand rested lightly on her hip sometimes forgot to take off the wedding ring he wore with me.

Later, when her stomach began to swell, the chain disappeared.

“Three years of marriage and he never let you carry his child, but he allowed me to have his baby,” she taunted. “Don’t you get it? Isn’t it pathetic to keep clinging on? I’m telling you now. If you don’t give up your place, I’ll move right into your home. Then you’ll see whether Geoffrey stands with you or with me.”

When he came home, the chat records were still open on the screen, the floor littered with the shattered porcelain vase I had smashed.

Yet, he only lifted a brow and asked, “Nothing you’d like to explain?”

My ragged breathing mixed with the heavy smell of his cigar.

He gave a soft laugh, blowing out a smoke ring. “She’s just a kid. Why bother arguing with her?”

His tone was light, almost careless, as though all the blood and fire he waded through to rise in the business world had been for her, not for me.

“Yes, she really is just a kid,” I said and tossed a hospital record onto the table.

Upon seeing it, he froze, then sat upright instantly.

“She had a miscarriage,” I said lightly. “So I helped teach her what it means to be human.”

“Paisley!”

His hands clamped down on my shoulders so hard I thought my bones might break. My back also hit the wall, but I only curved my lips, enjoying the sight of his bloodshot eyes.

In this lifetime, I had only seen him like this twice.

First was in our last year of high school, when he saw my father drag me half-dressed by the hair into the street, ready to drown me in the river. That night, he stabbed my father eighteen times.

And now, because this girl had lost his child.

His grip tightened as he demanded an answer for my cruelty.

“How rare,” I whispered with a smile. “To finally see Mr. Dittman lose his composure.”

I laughed without a hint of remorse.

“You’re a woman yourself! How could you do something like that to her?” he shouted.