CHAPTER 4.

Sabrina’s POV.

I woke up to a water stain on the hospital ceiling.

I had been staring at it for seven days.

The doctors called it a recovery. They told me I was lucky to be alive, that the emergency had been severe. But as I lay there, tangled in starched, antiseptic-smelling sheets with an IV still taped to my arm, I didn’t feel lucky. I felt like I owed someone a debt I couldn’t name.

Six hopes. That was the tally now. Six hopes that had flickered and faded within me over seven years.

Cole had been the one to hold my hand while the anesthesia wore off. Cole was the one who bullied the nurses into getting me extra blankets. The nurse told me he was the one who gave his blood when I needed it most, because Leon’s phone was unreachable and mine was the same type.

Watching him sleep in the uncomfortable plastic chair next to my bed, his jaw lined with stubble from days of neglect, made something tighten painfully in my chest.

Because Leon never came.

Not once. No flowers. No calls. Just an email sent three days ago, not even from him, but from his personal assistant.

Subject: Divorce Documents.

The message was efficient, brutal, and short: Please find the attached documents. Do not return to the residence. Alimony will be processed upon signature.

He was evicting me like a tenant who had missed rent.

Even his mother, usually my ally, had called only once. Her voice hadn’t held sympathy, only a tight, suffocated frustration. “Again, Sabrina? Really?” she had asked, as if my loss were something I had chosen.

Logic told me it was over. But grief makes you stupid. It makes you cling to the jagged edges of something that has already cut you loose.

My phone buzzed on the bedside table. A text from Cole.

“I know you’ve been discharged. Don’t move. I’m coming to get you. I have a safe place set up. You are not going back to that house.”

I stared at the screen, his protective anger radiating through the text. He was right. I knew he was right.

But I hadn’t signed the papers yet.

Technically, it was still my home. Technically, I was still his wife. A delusional, pathetic part of me whispered that if Leon just saw me—if he saw how broken I was—he might remember the man he used to be.

I didn’t reply to Cole. Instead, I gathered my meager belongings, called my driver, and slipped out the side exit before Cole could show up.

*

The ride home blurred past in pieces I couldn’t hold onto. I rehearsed what I would say. I prepared to beg if I had to.

But when the car turned into the driveway, the words fell apart before I could reach for them.

Balloons.

Hundreds of them, tied to the wrought-iron gates and bobbing along the porch. Pastel blue and soft pink.

My heart stuttered, then slammed hard against my ribs. Soft jazz drifted from the open windows. I could hear the clinking of crystal glasses and the low hum of laughter.

A party?

I turned to my driver, confused. He wouldn’t meet my eyes. He stared straight ahead, his grip tightening on the steering wheel.

A strange, frantic hope bloomed in my chest, fragile and desperate. Did he know? Was this a welcome home? Had he realized how cruel the email was and decided to fix it?

It was ridiculous.

It was the only explanation I could hold onto.

“Thank you,” I whispered, stepping out.

I walked toward the front door, my legs trembling. I smoothed down my wrinkled dress, took a breath that didn’t quite reach my lungs, and pushed the heavy oak doors open.

“Leon, I—”

The words dissolved the second I stepped inside.

The room fell quiet.

The living room was packed. Leon’s family, our mutual friends, his colleagues. But they weren’t looking at me.

They were looking at the couple in the center of the room.

Leon stood there, looking more relaxed than I had seen him in years. One arm was wrapped around Zara’s waist.

And Zara… Zara was glowing. Her hands rested atop a swollen, unmistakable curve beneath her silk dress.

Leon’s hand rested over hers, his thumb moving slowly, possessively, across her stomach.

The banner behind them read: Welcome Baby Boy.

Everything inside me went still.

It wasn’t a welcome home.

It wasn’t an apology.

It was a celebration.

While I was in a hospital bed fighting for my life, he had been planning this.

The silence stretched until it felt unbearable. Then Leon looked up.

There was no guilt in his eyes. No hesitation. Just a flicker of irritation, like I had interrupted something trivial.

“What are you doing here?” he asked.

I opened my mouth, but nothing came out at first. My throat closed around the words. My eyes flicked to his mother. She lifted her glass, deliberately avoiding my gaze.

“You… you knew,” I managed, my voice breaking under the weight of it. “I was discharged today. And you’re… doing this?”

“I sent you an email, Sabrina,” Leon said, his tone bored. “You weren’t supposed to come back. You’re making a scene.”

“A scene?” I took a step forward, the floor feeling uneven beneath my feet. “I just got out of the hospital, Leon. I am still recovering. And you’re throwing a shower for your mistress in my house?”

Zara flinched, pressing closer into his side. Leon’s expression hardened instantly.

“It’s not your house anymore,” he snapped. “And Zara is not my mistress. She is the mother of my son. Something you evidently can’t be.”

The words hit clean and deep.

For a second, I couldn’t feel anything at all.

“Escort her out,” Leon said, gesturing to two of his cousins.

They approached slowly, discomfort written across their faces. “Come on, Sabrina. Don’t make this worse,” one muttered.

I looked around the room—at the people who had sat at my table, laughed in this space, called me family.

No one moved.

No one spoke.

I was already gone to them.

I didn’t fight when they reached for me. I didn’t have anything left to fight with. I turned and walked out, the door closing behind me with a final, hollow click.

I stood on the curb outside the gate.

I had no bag. No car. No husband. No child.

The world felt distant, like I was standing just outside of it. I started walking without thinking, one step after another, not sure where I was going. Just away.

I barely registered the screech of tires.

A black SUV cut sharply onto the curb in front of me. The door flew open before the engine even cut, and Cole stepped out.

He didn’t look worried.

He looked furious.

“Sabrina.”

He closed the distance in seconds, grabbing my arm. His grip was firm, grounding, almost painful.

“Let me go,” I whispered, my voice barely there.

“Why are you doing this to yourself?” he demanded, his voice low and tight. “I told you to wait. I told you not to come here.”

“I just wanted to see…”

“To see what?” His grip tightened slightly. “That he doesn’t care? That he replaced you?” His eyes burned into mine. “He threw you away, Sabrina. Stop going back to prove it.”

“Stop it!” I sobbed, trying to pull free, but he didn’t let go.

“No. You need to hear it.” He pulled me toward the car. “Leon doesn’t deserve your loyalty, and he doesn’t deserve your tears.”

He opened the passenger door and pushed me inside before I could resist.

“If you can’t walk away on your own,” he said, leaning in, his voice low and steady, “then I’ll do it for you.”

He shut the door and locked it.

When he got into the driver’s seat, he didn’t look at me. His hands tightened around the wheel as he pulled away from the curb, the house shrinking in the rearview mirror.

“You’ve bled for him for seven years,” he said, his voice quieter now, but no less firm. “Now you’re going to learn what it feels like when someone bleeds for you.”