Chapter Seven — “The Ex-Factor”

“She’s disposable. She knows that.”

I didn’t breathe.

I didn’t move.

The words sank into the quiet like a knife, clean and sharp, and somehow louder than they were spoken. I stood frozen just outside his office door, the cracked frame casting light onto the hall carpet like it was trying to spit me out.

My throat closed.

So that’s what I was. Not his wife. Not a woman standing beside him in a ballroom filled with board members. It's just a placeholder. An object with an expiration date stamped in invisible ink.

Disposable.

I took one step back, then another, and fled down the hall barefoot. I didn’t care if Naomi saw. I didn’t care if the cameras saw. Let them. Let them see the girl who got dressed in diamonds just to be told she was furniture.

I shut the guest room door behind me like it was the only line I could draw.

I pressed my back to it, fists clenched, heart in pieces, and still—still—my phone buzzed again.

Ethan.

A new message lit the screen like a curse.

“He talks just like me, doesn’t he?”

I choked out something between a laugh and a sob. My body slid down the door until I was curled against the cold floorboards, shaking. It was too much. Too many ghosts, all in the same room. Damian in the other hallway, calculating how long I’d be useful. Ethan crawled out of my past like rot through the floorboards.

Still playing pretend, Ava?

He knew. He’d seen the headlines. The gala pictures would be online by now, me wrapped in Damian’s arm like a reward. A smile plastered across my face like I hadn’t been drowning on the inside.

I threw the phone under the bed.

I didn’t want to hear him. Didn’t want to hear any of them.

But memory is cruel, especially at night.

—

Flashback, Two Years Ago

“Say you’re sorry, Ava.”

“I didn’t—”

Ethan’s hand slammed down on the kitchen counter. “I said say it.”

Tears blurred the food-stained tiles beneath my feet. “I was just talking to him. It was my manager, Ethan.”

His smile was soft. Sickly sweet. “That’s not what it looked like.”

I backed into the fridge. “I didn’t do anything wrong.”

“And now you’re lying.”

The apology caught in my throat like acid. I knew what came next. Silence. Days of it. Disappearing acts and locked doors and punishment in the form of isolation. He didn’t need bruises. His words were sharp enough.

I said it.

Because saying it was easier than starving on the guilt he made up.

“I’m sorry.”

And he kissed my forehead like I’d passed a test.

—

I sat on the closet floor now, pulling my knees to my chest, wondering how I’d gone from that man to this one.

Different suits. Same damage.

Except this time, I wasn’t nineteen. This time, I had a reason to stay. A contract signed in ink and legal venom. A little sister in a hospital bed who still needed the next six months of private care.

I couldn’t leave.

But God—I wanted to.

—

In the morning, I expected the silence. But what I didn’t expect was Naomi standing in my doorway, arms folded, a tabloid in her hand.

“The leak dropped,” she said flatly.

I sat up too fast. “What leak?”

She held it out.

My face. Splashed across the front of the screen like a warning label.

“Billionaire Kingsley’s Wife Linked to Scandal with Ex-Felon. Secret Past?”

My stomach flipped.

Below the headline was a photo of me, one I hadn’t seen in years. Ethan’s arm around me, cigarette in hand. I looked like a girl I’d buried.

My voice cracked. “Where did they get that?”

Naomi didn’t answer immediately. Her eyes searched my face like she wanted to find a lie but couldn’t. “We need to do damage control. Fast. Damian’s called a PR crisis meeting in an hour.”

I blinked at her. “He knew?”

Naomi hesitated. “He’s… reviewing everything now.”

“Everything?”

“The photos. The texts. The court records. The ex-boyfriend.”

I couldn’t breathe.

“Tell him it was a mistake,” I whispered.

She raised a brow. “You think he’s the forgiving type?”

My pulse slammed through my chest. “No. But it wasn’t criminal. I was a kid.”

Naomi stepped forward. Softer this time. “You were a victim. But Damian doesn’t read between the lines. He reads headlines. And right now? You’re one.”

She left me with that.

—

Downstairs, the penthouse was buzzing with activity. PR staff. Mark. A tech guy pulling up data like it was war. Damian stood at the center of it all like a general in tailored black.

He didn’t look at me when I entered.

“Damage projection?” he asked someone.

“Twenty-eight million if this affects the investor meeting next week.”

“And if we spin it as youthful rebellion?”

A pause.

“Maybe half.”

He turned then.

His eyes found mine like they’d never touched me at all.

“I assume you’ve seen it,” he said.

I nodded, mouth dry.

“Then you know what’s at stake.”

“Yes.”

He paused. Walked over slowly, and measured, like he was calculating how breakable I still was.

“I need you at a gala in Italy next month,” he said. “Public display. Pictures. Smiles. You’ll be briefed on what to wear and say.”

I swallowed. “So I’m still useful, then.”

His jaw tensed.

But he didn’t deny it.

“Don’t give them another reason to question me, Ava.”

My voice cracked. “And what about questioning me?”

He didn’t answer.

He just turned away.

Like I really was disposable after all.