Chapter 1

Trinity's POV: A Night Of Pain 

If you want to know who a man truly loves, don't look at his wedding ring. Look at who he shields when a lunatic opens fire at a charity gala.

My husband chose my sister.

The bullet grazes my left arm and leaves a white-hot trail of agony. I stumble backward into a towering pyramid of champagne flutes. Crystal shatters, expensive vintage bathes my skin, and the grand ballroom explodes into a chorus of wealthy, panicked screams.

Bleeding from my arm, gasping for breath, I look across the floor. I call out weakly, “Julian, help me, please . . .” 

Julian Hayes, billionaire tech tycoon, my husband of four years, is panting and crawling on all fours, away from me.

“J-Julian, w-what are you . . .” I mutter. 

Vivian is cowering on the floor about ten feet away, sobbing softly. Julian stops over her and begins to caress her face. 

He gasps, “Hey, are you hit? Are you hit?”

“I think I sprained my ankle,” Vivian mumbles through tears. “My ankle . . .” 

Julian mutters, “Shit, let me see.”

“Julian?” I call again. 

He ignores me. He says, “I need to get you to a hospital quick.” He hooks a hand around her body and begins to lift Vivian off the floor. “Careful, I got you. I got you.”

“Julian, I-I am bleeding,” I call out, the breath hot in my throat. 

He glances at me then as another couple almost collide with him in their bid to escape the hall. He pauses for a moment. 

It's as if I'm one of the toppled tables, a table that somehow has a mouth and can speak. 

“What're you doing?” he demands. 

“I've been shot, Julian.”

“Shot?”

“I'm bleeding,” I cry out, “My hand . . .”

I look at the red graze on my arm. Somehow the blood has stopped running and is now caked. But the burning, oh the burning is nothing like I've ever felt. 

“And what am I supposed to do about it? he asks coldly. “Stop being dramatic and get up, Trinity! It's just a scratch! Vivian has a sprain!”

He trudges off under Vivian's weight. And just before the pair disappear through the door, Vivian turns to look at me. 

My sister is smiling. 

I stare at her, dumbfounded. Then they're gone. I'm a lone on the floor. The two guards who wrestled the gunman to the floor and took him away return. 

They see me. The bespectacled one crouches near me. He says, “Oh shit. You're bleeding. Can you walk?”

“I-Ithink I can.”

He calls out to his companion. “Charlie, we need to help this woman!”

Charlie runs over to us. Together, they hoist me. All 200 pounds of me, both of them groaning under the load. An ambulance is already parked. They help me into the back. 

Minutes later, I'm at the local hospital, lying in bed. Shortly after, a nurse comes over, stitches me up and asks if I wanted sedatives. 

I shake my head. “No.”

She smiles and is about to leave when I call her. “Excuse me . . .”

She comes back. 

“Um, my husband, alpha Julian Hayes. Is he here?” I ask. 

She narrows her eyes and says, “Miss Vivian?” 

“No, that's my sister. My sister,” I correct her. 

“Oh . . .”

She stares at me with a puzzled little hesitation and we both know what she's thinking as she looks at my puffy face, my oversized body. 

I'm overweight, but folks hardly notice me. Julian never introduces me. But everyone knows my sister, because she's always with my husband. 

The nurse clears her throat and says, “I'll go get alpha Hayes.”

“Stop.”

She looks at me. “Ma'am?” 

“Wheel me to where he is. It's better that way.” She looks at me uncertainly. I give her a reassuring, painful smile. “Trust me, it's better that way.”

The nurse starts wheeling my bed out of the room and down the corridor. I'm reminded of the night I gave birth to Lily, our daughter. Vivian had a fall the night before and was in the same hospital as me. Julian had been with her instead of me that night. He never showed up at my side. 

“Here we are,” says the nurse as she wheels me into a room. 

Standing by Vivian's bed is Julian. He turns around and freezes. He barks, “what is this?” 

“She asked to be brought here, alpha Hayes,” the nurse says fearfully. “I'm sorry.”

“Leave us.”

The nurse scampers out of the room. I raise myself on my elbows to look at my sister. There are no bandages, no stitched skin, no cuts, no bruises on her legs or arms. 

Julian is holding her hand, caressing it. He looks at me and sighs. 

“What now, Trinity, hm?” he asks. “Do you have to be in the same room as Vivian?”

“B-But I'm your wife, Julian—”

“Shut up!” he snaps. “Shut—” he closes his eyes, frustration pumping the veins in his temples, his hand in a fist. “Trinity, you are insufferable. You are as insufferable as you are overweight! You ruin everything. How did you get shot, by the way?” 

I frown. “What?”

“I mean, there're two dozens of people in that hall but only you got shot! Do you know why?”

Because I'm fat. I close my eyes, my lips trembling as I wait for him to say the damning words. ‘You're so fat you attract bullets.”

Julian believes the reason terrible things happen in the world is because there's a certain woman called Trinity in it. 

“Yeah, you know why, don't you?” He shakes his head pitifully. “Stop this self pity and do what you have to do. You don't have to be here with me . . .”

“What do you mean, Julian?” I ask. 

“You know exactly what I mean,” he says and turns back to caressing Vivian's hand. 

I lay back, the first real tears of the evening begins to fall slowly. Divorce, that's what Julian means. That's what he's been saying for four years. 

He doesn't want me anymore. He wants Vivian instead. I turn my head slowly to look at my sister. She's giggling, enjoying the attention. 

“I gotta go get Lily,” Julian says, pulling away from her. “The driver is bringing her here.”

If Julian doesn't value me even in crisis like this, maybe Lily will. My daughter will. Won't she?