Chapter 2

A chill shot through me, as if I'd been plunged into ice water.

A year ago, when that medical report came back, I'd felt like the sky had fallen.

The doctor told me my sperm motility was close to zero. The odds of conceiving naturally were next to nothing.

From that day on, I'd felt like I owed Camille.

She'd married me, and I couldn't give her a complete family. I couldn't give her the chance to become a mother.

So I'd bent over backward to make it up to her.

I put every house and car I owned in her name. I even transferred sixty percent of my company's shares to her.

At the time, I thought that even if we split up one day, at least she'd be well taken care of.

And Camille?

She'd wrapped her arms around me and said, "Honey, I don't even like kids. Don't feel guilty. I married you for you, not your sperm. I'm happy to stay child-free with you for the rest of my life."

She'd even been the one to suggest we sign a child-free agreement. It was all there in black and white, signed and fingerprinted by both of us.

I'd locked that agreement away in the very back of a drawer, treasuring it as the most precious promise of my life.

I'd thought I'd found the kind of love where two people stood by each other through thick and thin.

Instead, it had been an elaborate scam from start to finish.

I turned to look at Jonah.

We'd grown up together. Three years ago, his business went under and left him a hundred and ten thousand dollars in debt. When the creditors showed up at his door, his wife called me in tears.

I didn't hesitate. I covered the whole debt that same day.

He got down on his knees in front of me and swore he could never repay me in this lifetime.

And now? He'd known the whole truth about my wife's affair and the baby the entire time, and he'd helped cover it up and lie to me.

"Jonah," I said, my voice shaking. "I always treated you like a brother."

He didn't say a word.

Jonah turned his face away, unable to look at me.

Just then, my phone buzzed.

It was a message from Camille: [Honey, something came up and I have a meeting, so I'll be home late. I'll make up for missing our anniversary tomorrow. Love you.]

I stared at that message. It was so bitterly ironic that I could barely keep a grip on my phone.

I replied: [Where are you?]

She responded instantly with a photo of a dinner table set with a few dishes and wine glasses, captioned: [Having dinner with a client. Don't worry. Go home early.]

I let out a sneer.

She was in the ballroom about sixty-five feet behind me, wearing a red dress I'd never seen before, holding another man's child and cooing "sweetheart," and then turning around to text me that she was out with a client.

Thinking back, this kind of thing had happened plenty of times before.

Every time she said she had to work late, I believed her. I even sympathized with how hard she was working.

Sometimes she came home smelling of an unfamiliar perfume, and I'd just assumed it rubbed off from a coworker who'd been standing too close.

How could I have been so stupid?

Jonah saw me staring blankly at my phone. He sighed and patted me on the shoulder. "Don't make a scene, Adam. If you go in there now, you're only going to embarrass yourself. What's the point? Everyone's having a good time. Don't make things awkward."

"Camille didn't have a choice. Think about it. She's a woman. What's so wrong with wanting a baby?"

I ignored him.

Before he'd even finished, a wave of cheering and whistling erupted inside the ballroom.

I instinctively looked through the gap in the doors.

Oliver was holding a glass. In front of dozens of friends and family, he leaned down and kissed Camille on the lips.

Camille didn't pull away.

She even tilted her chin up a little, blushing all the way to her ears.

And in the stroller by her feet, that chubby, rosy-cheeked baby babbled and waved its little hands.

At that moment, it felt like someone had me by the throat. I couldn't get a single word out.

I couldn't hold back anymore.

I threw the doors open and charged inside.