Chapter 4

A place I Don't Belong 

The words blurred as I stared at them. I read them three times, four times, trying to understand what I was supposed to feel.

Five years.

I'd spent five years convincing myself that this marriage was enough. That unrequited love was better than no love at all. That someday, somehow, Adrian might wake up and realize I mattered.

Now, watching the space where that car had vanished, I understood the truth. I wasn't Adrian Harrison's wife. I was just someone he'd married for business reasons, and now there was someone else.

Someone pregnant. Someone he touched like she was precious. Someone who wasn't me.

I didn't sleep that night.

I sat in the dark of the master bedroom, fully dressed, waiting for the sound of Adrian's car in the driveway. Midnight came and went. Then one o'clock. The digital clock on the nightstand glowed like a countdown to something I wasn't ready to face.

By 2 AM, I stopped pretending he was coming home.

Instead, I moved to the study and pulled up my laptop. I told myself I was working. I told myself I wasn't obsessively researching Sophia Bennett for the second time in as many days. But that was a lie, and I'd already told myself enough of those.

I found her company bio. Her awards. A mention in a Forbes article about emerging executives in Asia. Nothing inappropriate, nothing that explained why Adrian's voice sounded different when he spoke to her, nothing that explained the image of his hand on her stomach.

At 4 AM, I gave up and showered.

By 6:30, I was dressed in a charcoal suit and sitting at the breakfast table, staring at a cup of coffee I couldn't bring myself to drink.

Adrian walked in at 6:45, impeccably dressed as always. But there was something different about him this morning. A certain energy. A lightness I'd never seen before.

"You're up early," I said.

The words came out flat. He didn't notice.

"Early meeting," he replied, moving past me to grab his own coffee. He didn't ask about my night nor did he ask whether I'd slept. He just poured his coffee and checked his phone, his expression already shifting into that distant professional mask he wore to the office.

"Working late?" I asked carefully.

He paused for half a second. "Yes. I had some things to handle."

Not I had things to handle. Some things. Vague. Noncommittal.

"All night?" I pressed.

Adrian's eyes lifted to mine. For a moment, something flickered across his face, irritation, maybe, or guilt. Then it was gone.

"I stayed at the office," he said. "There was no point coming home for a few hours."

The lie hung between us like smoke. He'd never lied to me before. Not directly. We simply didn't ask each other questions that required difficult answers.

"I see," I said.

He didn't linger after that. He finished his coffee in three long swallows and left without another word.

I arrived at Harrison Group to find the entire building buzzing.

Sophia Bennett had been hired as Senior Executive Consultant. The announcement came via internal memo, no fanfare, no explanation of what exactly her consulting would entail. But everyone had theories.

"Heard she's being groomed for a permanent position," one analyst said as I passed her desk.

"She's connected to the CEO," another whispered. "That's how she got the job."

No one said it explicitly. But the implication was clear. Sophia Bennett hadn't earned her place at Harrison Group. She'd been given it.

Just like I had been.

The boardroom felt smaller that afternoon.

I was presenting a preliminary analysis on market expansion when the door opened and Sophia walked in. She wore a deep emerald dress that made her look like she'd stepped out of a luxury magazine. Every eye in the room followed her as she took a seat across from me.

"Don't mind me," she said with a smile. "I'm just observing."

The senior executives immediately straightened. Suddenly my presentation, the same one that had been received well last week seemed less interesting.

"Your analysis is solid," one of the board members said, but he was already looking toward Sophia. "Though I wonder if we're thinking strategically enough. Sophia, what's your take?"

She didn't even glance at my slides. She just leaned back in her chair with the kind of confidence that came from knowing you'd already won.

"I think Evelyn's framework is conservative," Sophia said thoughtfully. "Which is smart, given the circumstances. But Adrian and I have been discussing some more aggressive approaches that could yield significantly higher returns."

Adrian and I.

The words landed like a punch.

"You've discussed this with the CEO?" Michael Reed asked, leaning forward with interest.

"Of course," Sophia said smoothly. "He values my perspective on these matters."

The meeting continued, but I'd already lost control of the room. By the time I finished presenting, everyone was looking at Sophia like she was the one who'd done all the work. And somehow, without saying anything explicitly inappropriate, she'd managed to make me look like a timid girl playing at business.

After the meeting, I gathered my materials with mechanical movements. The other executives filtered out, chatting with Sophia like she was suddenly the most interesting person in the building.

She caught up with me in the hallway.

"Evelyn," she said, her voice warm and friendly. "I wanted to introduce myself properly. I feel like we should know each other better, given how close Adrian and I are."

I kept walking. "I'm sure we'll see each other around."

"Actually, we go way back," Sophia continued, falling into step beside me. "Before Adrian married, we used to see each other quite often. We were quite close."

Were. Past tense. But the implication was that we could be close again. That whatever Adrian and I had, whatever this hollow arrangement was, could be replaced by something real.

"That's nice," I said coldly.

"It is, isn't it?" Sophia tilted her head, studying me with an expression that managed to be both sympathetic and pitying. "But I'm sure you understand that people change. Needs change. Sometimes the person you marry isn't the person you actually want to be with."

I stopped walking and turned to face her. "Are you making a point?"

"Not at all," Sophia said, and her smile was absolutely vicious beneath its polished surface. "Just making conversation."

She walked away before I could respond, her heels clicking against the marble floor like a countdown.

I made it to my office and closed the door. My hands were shaking. My chest felt too tight. I wanted to call Adrian. I wanted to demand answers. I wanted to ask him if he was in love with her.

Instead, I sat at my desk and stared at the wall.

My phone

buzzed.

A message from Olivia with no preamble.

Olivia: "I probably shouldn't be sending this."

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