Chapter 1

The moment I found out Royce Drayton took Blythe Renner to my private stable, I floored it the whole way there and slammed straight into his car, leaving it totaled.

Royce didn't even flinch. But when he noticed the bruise swelling on my arm from the impact, his expression darkened. "Does it hurt?"

"Why would you bring her here?" I shook off his hand, my voice trembling.

"Why?"

The stable was his gift to me for our third wedding anniversary, and the last safe place I had left in Grayport. The tabloids in the city used to joke that Royce's women could be found anywhere, at galas, in shopping malls, on yachts, even in our own marital bed.

This stable was the only place that was purely mine.

"It's just a stable. If you like it that much, I'll buy you another one."

Royce said it like it was nothing, and from the look on his face, he probably didn't even remember where this one came from. He'd given me too many things over the years. Anniversary gifts, holiday gifts, make-up gifts, just-because gifts, and gifts to smooth things over after cheating.

Before I could even process the sting of his indifference, I caught a glimpse of the white horse Blythe was riding, and my breath caught.

Luna was a foal I delivered with my own hands and raised from birth.

I was pregnant on our third anniversary. The baby came early and died just six hours after birth from underdeveloped lungs and heart.

My body was already fragile because of an earlier accident, and that was my sixth pregnancy. I'd spent seven months on strict bed rest just trying to hold on.

But it was all for nothing. The doctors told me I would probably never be able to carry a child again. I lost the will to live and sank into a depression so deep I nearly ended things.

Then Luna came along. The foal was stuck during delivery, still wrapped in the birthing sac, and I was the one who reached in and pulled her free with my bare hands.

She wobbled to her feet, and I was the first person she came to, looking up at me with those wide, bewildered eyes like she'd already decided I was her mother. From that day on, I raised her like she was my own child. She was gentle and affectionate, never once ill-tempered since the day she was born.

But now, the riding crop in Blythe's hand was coming down hard on Luna, again and again.